THE 


333.1 
r293«' 
189  3 


LAND  QUESTION 


WHAT  IT  INVOLVES,  AND  HOW  ALONE 
IT  CAN  BE  SETTLED 


BY 

HENRY  GEORGE 

AUTHOR  OF  “PROGRESS  AND  POVERTY,”  “  SOCIAL  PROBLEMS,”  ETC. 


“  We  hold  these  truths  to  be  self-evident :  That  all  men  are  created  equal ;  that 
they  are  endowed  by  their  Creator  with  certain  unalienable  rights ;  that  among 
these  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  That  to  secure  these  rights, 
governments  are  instituted  among  men,  deriving  their  just  powers  from  the  consent 
of  the  governed ;  that  whenever  any  form  of  government  becomes  destructive  of 
these  ends,  it  is  the  right  of  the  people  to  alter  or  abolish  it.” — Declaration  of 
Independence. 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES  L.  WEBSTER  &  COMPANY 

1893 


Copyright,  1881, 
by 


HENRY  GEORGE 


A 

3  l 
1633 


PREFACE. 


This  book  was  first  published  in  the  early  part 
of  1 88 1 ,  under  the  title  of  “  The  Irish  Land  Ques¬ 
tion.”  In  order  to  better  indicate  the  general  char¬ 
acter  of  this  subject,  and  to  conform  to  the  title 
under  which  it  had  been  republished  in  other  coun¬ 
tries,  the  title  was  subsequently  changed  to  “  The 
Land  Question.” 


'  -pzZoG 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Chapter  I. — Unpalatable  Truth, . 2 

II. — Distress  and  Famine,  .....  13 

III.  — A  Universal  Question, . 18 

IV.  — Proposed  Remedies, . 24 

V. — Whose  Land  is  it  ?  .  .  .  .  .  .  29 

VI. — Landlords’  Right  is  Labor’s  Wrong,  .  .  31 

VII. — The  Great-Great-Grandson  of  Captain  Kidd,  .  35 

VIII. — The  Only  Way,  the  Easy  Way,  ...  42 

IX.  — Principle  the  Best  Policy,  ....  45 

X.  — Appeals  to  Animosity,  .....  48 

XI. — How  to  Win,  .......  51 

XII. — In  the  United  States,  .....  58 

XIII.  — A  Little  Island  or  a  Little  World,  ...  60 

XIV.  — The  Civilization  that  is  Possible,  ...  63 

XV. — The  Civilization  that  is,  .  .  .  .  .  69 

XVI. — True  Conservatism, . 77 

XVII.— “  In  Hoc  Signo  Vinces,”  .  .  .  .  S4 


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THE 


LAND  QUESTION. 


CHAPTER  I. 

UNPALATABLE  TRUTH. 

In  charging  the  Dublin  jury  in  the  Land  League 
cases,  Mr.  Justice  Fitzgerald  told  them  that  the  land 
laws  of  Ireland  were  more  favorable  to  the  tenant  than 
those  of  Great  Britain,  Belgium,  or  the  United  States. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  Justice  Fitzgerald  is  right.  For 
in  Ireland  certain  local  customs  and  the  provisions  of 
the  Bright  Land  Act  mitigate  somewhat  the  power  of 
the  landlord  in  his  dealings  with  the  tenant.  In  Great 
Britain.,  save  by  custom  in  a  few  localities,  there  are  no 
such  mitigations.  In  Belgium  I  believe  there  are  none. 
There  are  certainly  none  in  the  United  States. 

This  fact  which  Justice  Fitzgerald  cites  will  be  re¬ 
echoed  by  the  enemies  of  the  Irish  movement.  And  it 
it  a  fact  well  worth  the  consideration  of  its  friends.  For 
the  Irish  movement  has  passed  its  first  stage,  and  it  is 
time  fora  more  definite  understanding  of  what  is  needed 
and  how  it  is  to  be  got. 

It  is  the  fashion  of  Land  League  orators  and  sympa¬ 
thizing  newspapers  in  this  country  to  talk  as  if  the  dis¬ 
tress  and  disquiet  in  Ireland  were  wholly  due  to  politi¬ 
cal  oppression,  and  our  national  House  of  Representa¬ 
tives  recently  passed,  by  unanimous  vote,  a  resolution 
which  censured  England  for  her  treatment  of  Ireland. 
But,  while  it  is  indeed  true  that  Ireland  has  been  deeply 
wronged  and  bitterly  oppressed  by  England,  it  is  not 
true  that  there  is  any  economic  oppression  of  Ireland 


8 


TILE  LAND  QUESTION. 


by  England  now.  To  whatevercause  Irish  distress  may 
be  due,  it  is  certainly  not  due  to  the  existence  of  laws 
which  press  on  industry  more  heavily  in  Ireland  than 
in  any  other  part  of  the  United  Kingdom. 

And,  further  than  this,  the  Irish  land  system,  which 
is  so  much  talked  of  as  though  it  were  some  peculiarly 
atrocious  system,  is  essentially  the  same  land  system 
which  prevails  in  all  civilized  countries,  which  we  of 
the  United  States  have  accepted  unquestion ingly,  and 
have  extended  over  the  whole  temperate  zone  of  a  new 
continent — the  same  system  which  all  over  the  civilized 
world  men  are  accustomed  to  consider  natural  and  just 

Justice  Fitzgerald  is  unquestionably  right. 

As  to  England,  it  is  well  known  that  the  English  land¬ 
lords  exercise  freely  all  the  powers  complained  of  in 
the  Irish  landlords,  without  even  the  slight  restrictions 
imposed  in  Ireland. 

As  to  Belgium,  let  me  quote  the  high  authority  of  the 
distinguished  Belgian  publicist,  M.  Emile  de  Laveleve, 
of  the  University  of  Liege.  He  says  that  the  Belgian 
tenant  farmers — for  tenancy  largely  prevails  even  where 
the  land  is  most  minutely  divided — are  rack-rented  with 
a  mercilessness  unknown  in  England  or  even  in  Ireland, 
and  are  compelled  to  vote  as  their  landlords  dictate  ! 

And  as  to  the  United  States,  let  me  ask  the  men  who 
to  applauding  audiences  are  nightly  comparing  the 
freedom  of  America  with  the  oppression  of  Ireland — let 
me  ask  the  Representatives  who  voted  for  the  resolution 
of  sympathy  with  Ireland,  this  simple  question  :  What 
would  the  Irish  landlords  lose,  what  would  the  Irish 
tenants  gain,  if,  to-morrow,  Ireland  were  made  a  State 
in  the  American  Union  and  American  law  substituted 
for  English  law  ? 

I  think  it  will  puzzle  them  to  reply.  The  truth  is  that 
the  gain  would  be  to  the  landlords,  the  loss  to  the 
tenants.  The  simple  truth  is,  that,  under  our  laws,  the 
Irish  landlords  could  rack-rent,  distrain,  evict,  or  absent 
themselves,  as  they  pleased,  and  without  any  restriction 
from  Ulster  tenant-right  or  legal  requirement  of  com¬ 
pensation  for  improvements.  Under  our  laws  they 
could,  just  as  freely  as  they  can  now,  impose  whatever 
terms  they  pleased  upon  their  tenants — whether  as  to 
c  ultivation,  as  to  improvements,  as  to  game,  as  to  mar- 


UNPALATABLE  TRUTH. 


9 


riages,  as  to  voting,  or  as  to  anything  else.  For  these 
powers  do  not  spring  from  special  laws.  They  are 
merely  incident  to  the  right  of  property  ;  they  result 
simply  from  the  acknowledgment  of  the  right  of  the 
owner  of  land  to  do  as  he  pleases  with  his  own — to  let 
it,  or  not  let  it.  So  far  as  law  can  give  them  to  him, 
every  American  landlord  has  these  powers  as  fully  as 
any  Irish  landlord.  Can  not  the  American  owner  of 
land  make,  in  letting  it,  any  stipulation  he  pleases  as  to 
how  it  shall  be  used,  or  improved,  or  cultivated  ?  Can 
he  not  reserve  any  of  his  own  rights  upon  it,  such  as 
the  right  of  entry,  or  of  cutting  wood,  or  shooting  game, 
or  catching  fish  ?  And,  in  the  absence  of  special  agree¬ 
ment,  does  not  American  law  give  him,  what  the  law  of 
Ireland  does  not  now  give  him,  the  ownership  at  the 
expiration  of  the  lease  of  all  the  improvements  made  by 
the  tenant  ? 

What  single  power  has  the  Irish  landowner  that  the 
American  landowner  has  not  as  fully?  Is  not  the  Amer¬ 
ican  landlord  just  as  free  as  is  the  Irish  landlord  to  re- 
fuse  to  rent  his  lands  or  his  houses  to  any  one  who  does 
not  attend  a  certain  church  or  vote  a  certain  ticket  ?  Is 
he  not  quite  as  free  to  do  this  as  he  is  free  to  refuse  his 
contributions  to  all  but  one  particular  benevolent  so¬ 
ciety  or  political  committee  ?  Or,  if,  not  liking  a  cer¬ 
tain  newspaper,  he  chooses  to  give  notice  to  quit  to  any 
tenant  whom  he  finds  taking  that  newspaper,  what  law 
can  be  invoked  to  prevent  him  ?  There  is  none.  The 
property  is  his,  and  he  can  let  it,  or  not  let  it,  as  he 
wills.  And,  having  this  power  to  let  or  not  let,  he  has 
power  to  demand  any  terms  he  pleases. 

That  Ireland  is  a  conquered  country  ;  that  centuries 
ago  her  soil  was  taken  from  its  native  possessors  and 
parcelled  out  among  aliens,  and  that  it  has  been  confis¬ 
cated  again  and  again,  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  real 
question  of  to-day — no  more  to  do  with  it  than  have  the 
confiscations  of  Marius  and  Sylla.  England,  too,  is  a 
conquered  country  ;  her  soil  has  been  confiscated  again 
and  again  ;  and,  spite  of  all  talk  about  Saxon  and  Celt, 
it  is  not  probable  that,  after  the  admixture  of  genera¬ 
tions,  the  division  of  landholder  and  non-landholder  any 
more  coincides  with  distinction  of  race  in  the  one  coun¬ 
try  than  in  the  other.  That  Irish  land  titles  rest  on 


10 


THE  LA  HD  QUEST  I  OH. 


force  and  fraud  is  true  ;  but  so  do  land  titles  in  every 
country — even  to  a  large  extent  in  our  own  peacefully 
settled  country.  Even  in  our  most  recently  settled 
States,  how  much  land  is  there  to  which  title  has  been 
got  by  fraud  and  perjury  and  bribery — by  the  arts  of 
the  lobbyist  or  the  cunning  tricks  of  hired  lawyers,  by 
double-barrelled  shotguns  and  repeating  rifles  ! 

The  truth  is  that  the  Irish  land  system  is  simply  the 
general  system  of  modern  civilization.  In  no  essential 
feature  does  it  differ  from  the  system  that  obtains  here 
— in  what  we  are  accustomed  to  consider  the  freest 
country  under  the  sun.  Entails  and  primogeniture  and 
family  settlements  may  be  in  themselves  bad  things, 
and  may  sometimes  interfere  with  putting  the  land  to 
its  best  use,  but  their  effects  upon  the  relations  of  land¬ 
lord  and  tenant  are  not  worth  talking  about.  As  for 
rack-rent,  which  is  simply  a  rent  fixed  at  short  intervals 
by  competition,  that  is  in  the  United  States  even  a  more 
common  way  of  letting  land  than  in  Ireland.  In  our 
cities  the  majority  of  our  people  live  in  houses  rented 
from  month  to  month  or  year  to  year  for  the  highest 
price  the  landlord  thinks  he  can  get.  The  usual  term, 
in  the  newer  States,  at  least,  for  the  letting  of  agricul¬ 
tural  land  is  from  season  to  season.  And  that  the  rent 
of  land  in  the  United  States  comes,  on  the  whole,  more 
closely  to  the  standard  of  rack,  or  full  competition  rent, 
there  can  be,  I  think,  little  doubt.  That  the  land  of 
Ireland  is,  as  the  apologists  for  landlordism  say,  largely 
under-rented  (that  is,  not  rented  for  the  full  amount  the 
landlord  might  get  with  free  competition)  is  probably 
true.  Miss  C.  G.  O’Brien,  in  a  recent  article  in  the  “  Nine¬ 
teenth  Century,”  states  that  the  tenant-farmers  gener¬ 
ally  get  for  such  patches  as  they  sublet  to  their  laborers 
twice  the  rent  they  pay  the  landlords.  And  we  hear  in¬ 
cidentally  of  many  “good  landlords,”  />.,  landlords  not 
in  the  habit  of  pushing  their  tenants  for  as  much  as  they 
might  get  by  rigorously  demanding  all  that  any  one 
would  give. 

These  things,  as  well  as  the  peculiar  bitterness  of 
complaints  against  middle-men  and  the  speculators  who 
have  purchased  encumbered  estates  and  manage  them 
solely  with  a  view  to  profit,  go  to  show  the  truth  of  the 
statement  that  the  land  of  Ireland  has  been,  by  its  pres* 


UNPALATABLE  TRUTH. 


it 


ent  owners,  largely  underlet,  when  considered  from  what 
we  would  deem  a  business  point  of  view.  And  this  is 
but  what  might  be  expected.  Human  nature  is  about 
the  same  the  world  over,  and  the  Irish  landlords  as  a 
class  are  no  better  nor  worse  than  would  be  other  men 
under  like  conditions.  An  aristocracy  such  as  that  of 
Ireland  has  its  virtues  as  well  as  its  vices,  and  is  in¬ 
fluenced  by  sentiments  which  do  not  enter  into  mere 
business  transactions — sentiments  which  must  often 
modify  and  soften  the  calculations  of  cold  self-interest. 
But  with  us  the  letting  of  land  is  as  much  a  business 
matter  as  the  buying  or  selling  of  wheat  or  of  stocks. 
An  American  would  not  think  he  was  showing  his  good¬ 
ness  by  renting  his  land  for  low  rates,  any  more  than  he 
would  think  he  was  showing  his  goodness  by  selling 
wheat  for  less  than  the  market  price,  or  stocks  for  less 
than  the  quotations.  So  in  those  districts  of  France  and 
Belgium  where  the  land  is  most  subdivided,  the  peasant 
proprietors,  says  M.  de  Laveleye,  boast  to  one  another 
of  the  high  rents  they  get,  just  as  they  boast  of  the  high 
prices  they  get  for  pigs  or  for  poultry. 

The  best  measure  of  rent  is,  of  course,  its  proportion 
to  the  produce.  The  only  estimate  of  Irish  rent  as  a  pro¬ 
portion  of  which  I  know  is  that  of  Buckle,  who  puts  it 
at  one-fourth  of  the  produce.  In  this  country  I  am  in¬ 
clined  to  think  one-fourth  would  generally  be  considered 
a  moderate  rent.  Even  in  California  there  is  considerable 
land  rented  for  one-third  the  crop,  and  some  that  rents 
for  one-half  the  crop  ;  while,  according  to  a  writer  in 
the  “Atlantic  Monthly,”  the  common  rent  in  that  great 
wheat-growing  section  of  the  new  Northwest  now  being 
opened  up  is  one-half  the  crop  ! 

It  does  not  seem  to  me  that  Justice  Fitzgerald’s  state¬ 
ment  can  be  disputed,  though  of  course  its  developments 
are  not  yet  as  strikingly  bad,  for  this  is  yet  a  new  coun¬ 
try,  and  tenants  are  comparatively  few,  and  land  com¬ 
paratively  easy  to  get.  The  American  land  system  is 
really  worse  for  the  tenant  than  the  Irish  system.  For 
with  us  there  is  neither  sentiment  nor  custom  to  check 
the  force  of  competition  or  mitigate  the  natural  desire 
of  the  landlord  to  get  all  he  can. 

Nor  is  there  anything  in  our  system  to  prevent  or 
check  absenteeism,  so  much  complained  of  in  regard  to 


12 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


Ireland.  Before  the  modern  era,  which  has  so  facilitated 
travel  and  communication,  and  made  the  great  cities  so 
attractive  to  those  having  money  to  spend,  the  preva¬ 
lence  of  Irish  absenteeism  may  have  been  due  to  special 
causes,  but  at  the  present  day  there  is  certainly  nothing 
peculiar  in  it.  Most  of  the  large  English  and  Scotch 
landholders  are  absentees  for  the  greater  part  of  the 
year,  and  many  of  them  live  permanently  or  for  long 
intervals  upon  the  Continent.  So  are  our  large  American 
landowners  generally  absentees.  In  New  York,  in  San 
Francisco,  in  Washington,  Boston,  Chicago,  and  St. 
Louis,  live  men  who  own  large  tracts  of  land  which 
they  seldom  or  never  see.  A  resident  of  Rochester  is 
said  to  own  no  less  than  four  hundred  farms  in  different 
States,  one  of  which  (I  believe  in  Kentucky)  comprises 
thirty-five  thousand  acres.  Under  the  plantation  sys¬ 
tem  of  farming  and  that  of  stock-raising  on  a  grand 
scale,  which  are  developing  so  rapidly  in  our  new  States, 
very  much  of  the  profits  go  to  professional  men  and 
capitalists  who  live  in  distant  cities.  Corporations 
whose  stock  is  held  in  the  East  or  in  Europe  own  much 
greater  bodies  of  land,  at  much  greater  distances,  than 
do  the  London  corporations  possessing  landed  estates 
in  Ireland.  To  say  nothing  of  the  great  land-grant  rail¬ 
road  companies,  the  Standard  Oil  Company  probably 
owns  more  acres  of  Western  la.nd  than  all  the  London 
companies  put  together  own  of  Irish  land.  And,  al¬ 
though  landlordism  in  its  grosser  forms  is  only  begin¬ 
ning  in  the  United  States,  there  is  probably  no  Ameri¬ 
can,  wherever  he  may  live,  who  cannot  in  his  immediate 
vicinity  see  some  instance  of  absentee  landlordism.  The 
tendency  to  concentration  born  of  the  new  era  ushered 
in  by  the  application  of  steam  shows  itself  in  this  way 
as  in  many  others.  To  those  who  can  live  where  they 
please,  the  great  cities  are  becoming  more  and  more  at¬ 
tractive. 

And  it  is  further  to  be  remarked  that  too  much 
stress  is  laid  upon  absenteeism,  and  that  it  might  be 
prevented  without  much  of  the  evil  often  attributed  to 
it  being  cured.  That  is  to  say,  that  to  his  tenantry 
and  neighborhood  the  owner  of  land  in  Galway  or 
Kilkenny  would  be  as  much  an  absentee  if  he  lived 
in  Dublin  as  if  he  lived  in  London,  and  that,  if  Irish 


DISTRESS  AND  FAMINE. 


n 

landlords  were  compelled  to  live  in  Ireland,  all  that  the 
Irish  people  would  gain  would  be,  metaphorically  speak¬ 
ing,  the  crumbs  that  fell  from  the  landlords’  tables.  For 
if  the  butter  and  eggs,  the  pigs  and  the  poultry,  of  the 
Irish  peasant  must  be  taken  from  him  and  exported  to 
pay  for  his  landlord’s  wine  and  cigars,  what  difference 
does  it  make  to  him  where  the  wine  is  drunk  or  the 
cigars  are  smoked  ? 


CHAPTER  II. 

DISTRESS  AND  FAMINE. 

t 

But  it  will  be  asked  :  If  the  land  system  which  pre¬ 
vails  in  Ireland  is  essentially  the  same  as  that  which 
prevails  elsewhere,  how  is  it  that  it  does  not  produce 
the  same  results  elsewhere  ? 

I  answer  that  it  does  everywhere  produce  the  same 
kind  of  results.  As  there  is  nothing  essentially  peculiar 
in  the  Irish  land  system,  so  is  there  nothing  essentially 
peculiar  in  Irish  distress.  Between  the  distress  in  Ire¬ 
land  and  the  distress  in  other  countries  there  may  be 
differences  in  degree  and  differences  in  manifestation  ; 
but  that  is  all. 

The  truth  is,  that  as  there  is  nothing  peculiar  in  the 
Irish  land  system,  so  is  there  nothing  peculiar  in  the 
distress  which  that  land  system  causes.  We  hear  a 
great  deal  of  Irish  emigration,  of  the  millions  of  sons 
and  daughters  of  Erin  who  have  been  compelled  to 
leave  their  native  soil.  But  have  not  the  Scottish  High¬ 
lands  been  all  but  depopulated  ?  Do  not  the  English 
emigrate  in  the  same  way,  and  for  the  same  reasons  ? 
Do  not  the  Germans  and  Italians  and  Scandinavians 
also  emigrate  ?  Is  there  not  a  constant  emigration  from 
the  Eastern  States  of  the  Union  to  the  Western — an 
emigration  impelled  by  the  same  motives  as  that  which 
sets  across  the  Atlantic  ?  Nor  am  I  sure  that  this  is 
not  in  some  respects  a  more  demoralizing  emigration 
than  the  Irish,  for  I  do  not  think  there  is  any  such 
monstrous  disproportion  of  the  sexes  in  Ireland  as  in 
Massachusetts  ?  If  French  and  Belgian  peasants  do 


14  THE  I  AND  QUESTION-. 

not  emigrate  as  do  the  Irish,  is  it  not  simply  because 
they  do  not  have  such  “  long  families  ”  ? 

There  has  recently  been  deep  and  wide-spread  dis¬ 
tress  in  Ireland,  and  but  for  the  contributions  of  charity 
many  would  have  perished  for  want  of  food.  But,  to 
say  nothing  of  such  countries  as  India,  China,  Persia, 
and  Syria,  is  it  not  true  that  within  the  last  few  years 
there  have  been  similar  spasms  of  distress  in  the  most 
highly  civilized  countries — not  merely  in  Russia  and  in 
Poland,  but  in  Germany  and  England  ?  Yes,  even  in 
the  United  States. 

Have  there  not  been,  are  there  not  constantly  occur¬ 
ring,  in  all  these  countries,  times  when  the  poorest 
classes  are  reduced  to  the  direst  straits,  and  large  num¬ 
bers  are  only  saved  from  starvation  by  charity? 

When  there  is  famine  among  savages  it  is  because 
food  enough  is  not  to  be  had.  But  this  was  not  the  case 
in  Ireland.  In  any  part  of  Ireland,  during  the  height 
of  what  was  called  the  famine,  there  was  food  enough 
for  whoever  had  means  to  pay  for  it.  The  trouble  was 
not  in  the  scarcity  of  food.  There  was,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  no  real  scarcity  of  food,  and  the  proof  of  it  is  that 
food  did  not  command  scarcity  prices.  During  all  the 
so-called  famine,  food  was  constantly  exported  from 
Ireland  to  England,  which  would  not  have  been  the 
case  had  there  been  any  more  true  famine  in  one  coun¬ 
try  than  in  the  other.  During  all  the  so-called  famine 
a  practically  unlimited  supply  of  American  meat  and 
grain  could  have  been  poured  into  Ireland,  through  the 
existing  mechanism  of  exchange,  so  quickly  that  the  re¬ 
lief  would  have  been  felt  instantaneously.  Our  send¬ 
ing  of  supplies  in  a  national  war-ship  was  a  piece  of 
vulgar  ostentation,  fitly  paralleled  by  their  ostentatious 
distribution  in  British  gunboats  under  the  nominal  su¬ 
perintendence  of  a  royal  prince.  Had  we  been  bent  on 
relief,  not  display,  we  might  have  saved  our  Govern¬ 
ment  the  expense  of  fitting  up  its  antiquated  war-ship, 
the  British  gunboats  their  coal,  the  Lord  Mavor  his 
dinner,  and  the  Royal  Prince  his  valuable  time.  A 
cable  draft,  turned  in  Dublin  into  postal  orders,  would 
have  afforded  the  relief,  not  merely  much  more  easily 
and  cheaply,  but  in  less  time  than  it  took  our  war-ship 
to  get  ready  to  receive  her  cargo  ;  for  the  reason  that 


DISTRESS  AMD  FA  MIND. 


*5 

so  many  of  the  Irish  people  were  starving  was,  not  that 
the  food  was  not  to  be  had,  but  that  they  had  not  the 
means  to  buy  it.  Had  the  Irish  people  had  money  or 
its  equivalent,  the  bad  seasons  might  have  come  and 
gone  without  stinting  any  one  of  a  full  meal.  Their 
effect  would  merely  have  been  to  determine  toward  Ire¬ 
land  the  flow  of  more  abundant  harvests. 

I  wish  clearly  to  bring  to  view  this  point.  The  Irish 
famine  was  not  a  true  famine  arising  from  scarcity  of 
food.  It  was  what  an  English  writer  styled  the  Indian 
famine — a  “  financial  famine,”  arising  not  from  scarcity 
of  food  but  from  the  poverty  of  the  people.  The  ef¬ 
fect  of  the  short  crops  in  producing  distress  was  not  so 
much  in  raising  the  price  of  food  as  in  cutting  off  the 
accustomed  incomes  of  the  people.  The  masses  of  the 
Irish  people  get  so  little  in  ordinary  times  that  they  are 
barely  able  to  live,  and  when  anything  occurs  to  inter¬ 
rupt  their  accustomed  incomes  they  have  nothing  to 
fall  back  on. 

Yet  is  this  not  true  of  large  classes  in  all  countries  ? 
And  are  not  all  countries  subject  to  just  such  famines  as 
this  Irish  famine  ?  Good  seasons  and  bad  seasons  are 
in  the  order  of  nature,  just  as  the  day  of  sunshine  and 
the  day  of  rain,  the  summer’s  warmth  and  the  winter’s 
snow.  But  agriculture  is,  on  the  whole,  as  certain  as 
any  other  pursuit,  for  even  those  industries  which  may 
be  carried  on  regardless  of  weather  are  subject  to  alter¬ 
nations  as  marked  as  those  to  which  agriculture  is  liable. 
There  are  good  seasons  and  bad  seasons  even  in  fishing 
and  hunting,  while  the  alternations  are  very  marked  in 
mining  and  in  manufacturing.  In  fact,  the  mdre  highly 
differentiated  branches  of  industry  which  advancing 
civilization  tends  to  develop,  though  less  directly  de¬ 
pendent  upon  rain  and  sunshine,  heat  and  cold,  seem 
increasingly  subject  to  alternations  more  frequent  and 
intense.  Though  in  a  country  of  more  diversified  in¬ 
dustry  the  failure  of  a  crop  or  two  could  not  have  such 
widespread  effects  as  in  Ireland,  vet  the  countries  of 
more  complex  industries  are  liable  to  a  greater  variety 
of  disasters.  A  war  on  another  continent  produces 
famine  in  Lancashire  ;  Parisian  milliners  decree  a 
change  of  fashion,  and  Coventry  operatives  are  only 
saved  from  starvation  by  public  alms  ;  a  railroad  com- 


i6 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


bination  decides  to  raise  the  price  of  coal,  and  Pennsyl¬ 
vania  miners  find  their  earnings  diminished  by  half  or 
totally  cut  off  ;  a  bank  breaks  in  New  York,  and  in  all 
the  large  American  cities  soup-houses  must  be  opened! 

In  this  Irish  famine  which  provoked  the  land  agita¬ 
tion,  there  is  nothing  that  is  peculiar.  Such  famines  on 
a  smaller  or  a  larger  scale  are  constantly  occurring. 
Nay,  more  !  the  fact  is,  that  famine,  just  such  famine  as 
this  Irish  famine,  constantly  exists  in  the  richest  and 
most  highly  civilized  lands.  It  persists  even  in  “good 
times”  when  trade  is  “  booming”  ;  it  spreads  and  rages 
whenever  from  any  cause  industrial  depression  comes. 
It  is  kept  under,  or  at  least  kept  from  showing  its  worst 
phases,  by  poor-rates  and  almshouses,  by  private  be¬ 
nevolence  and  by  vast  organized  charities,  but  it  still 
exists,  gnawing  in  secret  when  it  does  not  openly  rage. 
In  the  very  centres  of  civilization,  where  the  machinery 
of  production  and  exchange  is  at  the  highest  point  of 
efficiency,  where  bank-vaults  hold  millions,  and  show- 
windows  flash  with  more  than  a  prince’s  ransom,  where 
elevators  and  warehouses  are  gorged  with  grain,  and 
markets  are  piled  with  all  things  succulent  and  tooth¬ 
some,  where  the  dinners  of  Lucullus  are  eaten  every 
day,  and,  if  it  be  but  cool,  the  very  greyhounds  wear 
dainty  blankets — in  these  centres  of  wealth  and  power 
and  refinement,  there  are  always  hungry  men  and 
women  and  little  children.  Never  the  sun  goes  down 
but  on  human  beings  prowling  like  wolves  for  food,  or 
huddling  together  like  vermin  for  shelter  and  warmth. 
“  Always  with  You”  is  the  significant  heading  under 
which  a  New  York  paper,  in  these  most  prosperous 
times,  publishes  daily  the  tales  of  chronic  famine  ;  and 
in  the  greatest  and  richest  city  in  the  world — in  that 
very  London,  where  the  plenty  of  meat  in  the  butchers’ 
shops  seemed  to  some  savages  the  most  wondrous  of  ail 
its  wonderful  sights — in  that  very  London,  the  mortuary 
reports  have  a  standing  column  for  deaths  by  starva¬ 
tion. 

But  no  more  in  its  chronic  than  in  its  spasmodic 
forms  is  famine  to  be  measured  by  the  deaths  from 
starvation.  Perfect,  indeed,  in  all  its  parts  must  be  the 
human  machine  if  it  can  run  till  the  last  bit  of  availa¬ 
ble  tissue  be  drawn  on  to  feed  its  fires.  It  is  under 


DISTRESS  AND  FAMINE. 


17 


the  guise  of  disease  to  which  physicians  can  give  less 
shocking  names,  that  famine,  especially  the  chronic 
famine  of  civilization,  kills.  And  the  statistics  of  mor¬ 
tality,  especially  of  infant  mortality,  show  that  in  the 
richest  communities  famine  is  constantly  at  its  work. 
Insufficient  nourishment,  inadequate  warmth  and  cloth¬ 
ing,  and  unwholesome  surroundings,  constantly,  in  the 
very  centres  of  plenty,  swell  the  death  rates.  What  is 
this  but  famine — just  such  famine  as  the  Irish  famine? 
It  is  not  that  the  needed  things  are  really  scarce  ;  but 
that  those  whose  need  is  direst  have  not  the  means  to  get 
them,  and,  when  not  relieved  by  charity,  want  kills 
them  in  its  various  ways.  When,  in  the  hot  midsummer, 
little  children  die  like  flies  in  the  New  York  tenement 
wards,  what  is  that  but  famine  ?  And  those  barges 
crowded  with  such  children  that  a  noble  and  tender 
charity  sends  down  New  York  Harbor  to  catch  the  fresh 
salt  breath  of  the  Atlantic — are  they  not  fighting  famine 
as  truly  as  was  our  food-laden  war-ship  and  the  Royal 
Prince’s  gunboats  ?  Alas  !  to  find  famine  one  has  not 
to  cross  the  sea. 

There  was  bitter  satire  in  the  cartoon  that  one  of  our 
illustrated  papers  published  when  subscriptions  to  the 
Irish  famine  fund  were  being  made — a  cartoon  that 
represented  James  Gordon  Bennett  sailing  away  for 
Ireland  in  a  boat  loaded  down  with  provisions,  while  a 
sad-eyed,  hungry-looking,  tattered  group  gazed  wist¬ 
fully  on  them  from  the  pier.  The  bite  and  the  bitterness 
of  it,  the  humiliating  sting  and  satire  of  it,  were  in  its 
truth. 

This  is  “the  home  of  freedom,”  and  “the  asylum 
of  the  oppressed  ”  ;  our  population  is  yet  sparse,  our 
public  domain  yet  wide  ;  we  are  the  greatest  of  food 
producers,  yet  even  here  there  are  beggars,  tramps, 
paupers,  men  torn  by  anxiety  for  the  support  of  their 
families,  women  who  know  not  which  way  to  turn, 
little  children  growing  up  in  such  poverty  and  squalor 
that  only  a  miracle  can  keep  them  pure.  “  Always  with 
you,”  even  here.  What  is  the  week  or  the  day  of  the 
week  that  our  papers  do  not  tell  of  man  or  woman  who, 
to  escape  the  tortures  of  want,  has  stepped  out  of  life 
unbidden  ?  What  is  this  but  famine  ? 


2 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


18 


CHAPTER  III. 

A  UNIVERSAL  QUESTION. 

Let  me  be  understood.  I  am  not  endeavoring  to  ex 
cuse  or  belittle  Irish  distress.  I  am  merely  pointing 
out  that  distress  of  the  same  kind  exists  elsewhere. 
This  is  a  fact  I  want  to  make  clear,  for  it  has  hitherto, 
in  most  of  the  discussions  of  the  Irish  Land  Question, 
been  ignored.  And  without  an  appreciation  of  this 
fact  the  real  nature  of  the  Irish  Land  Ouestion  is  not 
understood,  nor  the  real  importance  of  the  agitation 
seen. 

What  I  contend  for  is  this  :  That  it  is  a  mistake  to 
consider  the  Irish  Land  Question  as  a  mere  local  ques¬ 
tion,  arising  out  of  conditions  peculiar  to  Ireland,  and 
which  can  be  settled  by  remedies  that  can  have  but 
local  application.  On  the  contrary,  I  contend  that  what 
has  been  brought  into  prominence  by  Irish  distress, 
and  forced  into  discussion  by  Irish  agitation,  is  some¬ 
thing  infinitely  more  important  than  any  mere  local 
question  could  be  ;  it  is  nothing  less  than  that  question 
of  transcendent  importance  which  is  everywhere  begin¬ 
ning  to  agitate,  and,  if  not  settled,  must  soon  convulse 
the  civilized  world — the  question  whether,  their  politi¬ 
cal  equality  conceded  (for,  where  this  has  not  already 
been,  it  soon  will  be),  the  masses  of  mankind  are  to  re¬ 
main  mere  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water  for 
the  benefit  of  a  fortunate  few  ?  whether,  having  escaped 
from  feudalism,  modern  society  is  to  pass  into  an  in¬ 
dustrial  organization  more  grinding  and  oppressive, 
more  heartless  and  hopeless,  than  feudalism  ?  whether, 
amid  the  abundance  their  labor  creates,  the  producers 
of  wealth  are  to  be  content  in  good  times  with  the 
barest  of  livings  and  in  bad  times  to  suffer  and  to  starve? 
What  is  involved  in  this  Irish  Land  Ouestion  is  not  a 
mere  local  matter  between  Irish  landlords  and  Irish 
tenants,  but  the  great  social  problem  of  modern  civili¬ 
zation.  What  is  arraigned  in  the  arraignment  of  the 
claims  of  Irish  landlords  is  nothing  less  than  the  wide- 


A  UNIVERSAL  QUESTION. 


*9 


spread  institution  of  private  property  in  land.  In  the 
assertion  of  the  natural  rights  of  the  Irish  people  is  the 
assertion  of  the  natural  rights  that,  by  virtue  of  his  ex¬ 
istence,  pertain  everywhere  to  man. 

It  is  probable  that  the  Irish  agitators  did  not  at  first 
perceive  the  real  bearing  and  importance  of  the  ques¬ 
tion  they  took  in  hand.  But  they — the  more  intelli¬ 
gent  and  earnest  of  them,  at  least — must  now  begin  to 
realize  it.*  Yet,  save,  perhaps,  on  the  part  of  the  ultra 
Tories,  who  would  resist  any  concession  as  the  open¬ 
ing  of  a  door  that  cannot  again  be  shut,  there  is  on  all 
sides  a  disposition  to  ignore  the  real  nature  of  the  ques¬ 
tion,  and  to  treat  it  as  springing  from  conditions  pecu¬ 
liar  to  Ireland.  On  the  one  hand,  there  is  a  large 
class  in  England  and  elsewhere,  who,  while  willing  to 
concede  or  even  actually  desire  that  something  should 
be  done  for  Ireland,  fear  any  extension  of  the  agitation 
into  a  questioning  of  the  rights  of  landowners  else¬ 
where.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  the  Irish  leaders 
seem  anxious  to  confine  attention  in  the  same  way,  evi¬ 
dently  fearing  that,  should  the  question  assume  a 
broader  aspect,  strong  forces  now  with  them  might  fall 
away  and,  perhaps  to  a  large  extent,  become  directly 
and  strongly  antagonistic. 

But  it  is  not  possible  to  so  confine  the  discussion ;  no 
more  possible  than  it  was  possible  to  confine  to  France 
the  questions  involved  in  the  French  Revolution  ;  no 
more  possible  than  it  was  possible  to  keep  the  discus¬ 
sion  which  arose  over  slavery  in  the  Territories  confined 
to  the  subject  of  slavery  in  the  Territories.  And  it  is 
best  that  the  truth  be  fully  stated  and  clearly  recognized. 
He  who  sees  the  truth,  let  him  proclaim  it,  without 
asking  who  is"  for  it  or  who  is  againstdt  This  is  not 
radicalism  in'  the  Dad  sense  which  so  many  attach  to 
the  word.  This  is  conservatism  in  the  true  sense. 

What  gives  to  the  Irish  land  question  its  supreme  sig¬ 
nificance  is  that  it  brings  into  attention  and  discussion. 
— nay,  that  it  forces  into  attention  and  discussion,  not  a 


*  The  “  Irish  World,”  which,  though  published  in  New  York,  has  ex¬ 
erted  a  large  influence  upon  the  agitation  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic, 
does  realize,  and  has  from  the  first  frankly  declared,  that  the  fight  must 
be  against  landlordism  in  toto  and  everywhere. 


20  TILE  LAND  QUESTION. 

mere  Irish  question,  but  a  question  of  world-wide  im 
portance. 

What  has  brought  the  land  question  to  the  front  in 
Ireland,  what  permits  the  relation  between  land  and 
labor  to  be  seen  there  with  such  distinctness — to  be  seen 
even  by  those  who  cannot  in  other  places  perceive 
them — is  certain  special  conditions.  Ireland  is  a  coun¬ 
try  of  dense  population,  so  that  competition  for  the  use 
of  land  is  so  sharp  and  high  as  to  produce  marked  ef¬ 
fects  upon  the  distribution  of  wealth.  It  is  mainly  an 
agricultural  country,  so  that  production  is  concerned 
directly  and  unmistakably  with  the  soil.  Its  industrial 
organization  is  largely  that  simple  one  in  which  an  em¬ 
ploying  capitalist  does  not  stand  between  laborer  and 
landowner,  so  that  the  connection  between  rent  and 
wages  is  not  obscured.  Ireland,  moreover,  was  never  con¬ 
quered  by  the  Romans,  nor,  until  comparatively  recently, 
by  any  people  who  had  felt  in  their  legal  system  the  ef¬ 
fect  of  Roman  domination.  It  is  the  European  coun¬ 
try  in  which  primitive  ideas  as  to  land  tenures  have 
longest  held  their  sway,  and  the  circumstances  of  its 
conquest,  its  cruel  misgovernment,  and  the  differences 
of  race  and  religion  between  the  masses  of  the  people 
and  those  among  whom  the  land  was  parcelled,  have 
tended  to  preserve  old  traditions  and  to  direct  the 
strength  of  Irish  feeling  and  the  fervor  of  Irish  imagi¬ 
nation  against  a  system  which  forces  the  descendant  of 
the  ancient  possessors  of  the  soil  to  pay  tribute  for  it 
to  the  representative  of  a  hated  stranger.  It  is  for 
these  reasons  that  the  connection  between  Irish  distress 
and  Irish  landlordism  is  so  easily  seen  and  readily  real¬ 
ized. 

But  does  not  the  same  relation  exist  between  Eng¬ 
lish  pauperism  and  English  landlordism — between 
American  tramps  and  the  American  land  system  ?  Es¬ 
sentially  the  same  land  system  as  that  of  Ireland  exists 
elsewhere,  and,  wherever  it  exists,  distress  of  essentially 
the  same  kind  is  to  be  seen.  And  elsewhere,  just  as 
certainly  as  in  Ireland,  is  the  connection  between  the 
two  that  of  cause  and  effect. 

When  the  agent  of  the  Irish  landlord  takes  from  the 
Irish  cottier  for  rent  his  pigs,  his  poultry,  or  his  potatoes, 
or  the  money  that  he  gains  by  the  sale  of  these  things,  it 


A  UNIVERSAL  QUESTION.  21 

is  clear  enough  that  this  rent  comes  from  the  earnings 
of  labor,  and  diminishes  what  the  laborer  gets.  But  is 
not  this  in  reality  just  as  clear  when  a  dozen  middle¬ 
men  stand  between  laborer  and  landlord  ?  Is  it  not 
just  as  clear  when,  instead  of  being  paid  monthly  or 
quarterly  or  yearly,  rent  is  paid  in  a  lumped  sum  called 
purchase  money  ?  Whence  comes  the  incomes  which 
the  owners  of  land  in  mining  districts,  in  manufacturing 
districts,  or  in  commercial  districts,  receive  for  the  use 
of  their  land?  Manifestly,  they  must  come  from  the 
earnings  of  labor — there  is  no  other  source  from  which 
they  can  come.  From  what  are  the  revenues  of  Trinity 
Church  corporation  drawn,  if  not  from  the  earnings  of 
labor  ?  What  is  the  source  of  the  income  of  the  Astors,  if 
it  is  not  the  labor  of  laboring  men,  women,  and  children  ? 
When  a  man  makes  a  fortune  by  the  rise  of  real  estate, 
as  in  New  York  and  elsewhere  many  men  have  done 
within  the  past  few  months,  what  does  it  mean  ?  It 
means  that  he  may  have  fine  clothes,  costly  food,  a  grand 
house  luxuriously  furnished,  etc.  Now,  these  things  are 
not  the  spontaneous  fruits  of  the  soil  ;  neither  do  they 
fall  from  heaven,  nor  are  they  cast  up  by  the  sea.  They 
are  products  of  labor — can  only  be  produced  by  labor. 
And  hence,  if  men  who  do  no  labor  get  them,  it  must 
necessarily  be  at  the  expense  of  those  who  do  labor. 

It  may  seem  as  if  I  were  needlessly  dwelling  upon  a 
truth  apparent  by  mere  statement.  Yet,  simple  as  this 
truth  is,  it  is  persistently  ignored.  This  is  the  reason 
that  the  true  relation  and  true  importance  of  the  ques¬ 
tion  which  has  come  to  the  front  in  Ireland  are  so  little 
realized. 

To  give  an  illustration  :  In  his  article  in  the  “  North 
American  Review”  last  year,  Mr.  Parnell  speaks  as 
though  the  building  up  of  manufactures  in  Ireland 
would  lessen  the  competition  for  land.  What  justifica¬ 
tion  for  such  a  view  is  there  either  in  theory  or  in  fact  ? 
Can  manufacturing  be  carried  on  without  land  any  more 
than  agriculture  can  be  carried  on  without  land  ?  Is 
not  competition  for  land  measured  by  price,  and,  if 
Ireland  were  a  manufacturing  country,  would  not  the 
value  of  her  land  be  greater  than  now  ?  Had  English 
clamor  for  “  protection  to  home  industry”  not  been  suf¬ 
fered  to  secure  the  strangling  of  Irish  industries  in  their 


22 


TILE  LA. YD  QUESTION [ 


infancy,  Ireland  might  now  be  more  of  a  manufacturing 
country  with  larger  population  and  a  greater  aggregate 
production  of  wealth.  But  the  tribute  which  the  land- 
owners  could  have  taken  would  likewise  have  been 
greater.  Put  a  Glasgow,  a  Manchester,  or  a  London  in 
one  of  the  Irish  agricultural  counties,  and,  where  the 
landlords  now  take  pounds  in  rent,  they  would  be  en¬ 
abled  to  demand  hundreds  and  thousands  of  pounds. 
And  it  would  necessarily  come  from  the  same  source — 
the  ultimate  source  of  all  incomes — the  earnings  of  la¬ 
bor.  That  so  large  a  proportion  of  the  laboring  class 
would  not  have  to  compete  with  each  other  for  agricul¬ 
tural  land  is  true.  But  they  would  have  to  do  what  is 
precisely  the  same  thing.  They  would  have  to  compete 
with  each  other  for  employment — for  the  opportunity 
to  make  a  living.  And  there  is  no  reason  to  think  that 
this  competition  would  be  less  intense  than  now.  On 
the  contrary,  in  the  manufacturing  districts  of  England 
and  Scotland,  just  as  in  the  agricultural  districts  of 
Ireland,  the  competition  for  the  privilege  of  earning  a 
living  forces  wages  to  such  a  minimum  as,  even  in  good 
times,  will  only  give  a  living. 

What  is  the  difference  ?  The  Irish  peasant  cultivator 
hires  his  little  farm  from  a  landlord,  and  pays  rent  di¬ 
rectly.  The  English  agricultural  laborer  hires  himself 
to  an  employing  farmer  who  hires  the  land,  and  who 
out  of  the  produce  pays  to  the  one  his  wages  and  to  the 
other  his  rent.  In  both  cases  competition  forces  the  la¬ 
borer  down  to  a  bare  living  as  a  net  return  for  his  work, 
and  only  stops  at  that  point  because,  when  men  do  not 
get  enough  to  live  on,  they  die  and  cease  to  compete. 
And,  in  the  same  way,  competition  forces  the  employ¬ 
ing  farmer  to  give  up  to  the  landlord  all  that  he  has  left 
after  paying  wages,  save  the  ordinary  returns  of  capital 
— for  the  profits  of  the  English  farmer  do  not,  on  the 
average,  I  understand,  exceed  five  or  six  per  cent.  And 
in  other  businesses,  such  as  manufacturing,  competition 
in  the  same  way  forces  down  wages  to  the  minimum  of 
a  bare  living,  while  rent  goes  up  and  up.  Thus  is  it 
clear  that  no  change  in  methods  or  improvements  in  the 
processes  of  industry  lessens  the  landlord’s  power  of 
claiming  the  lion’s  share. 

I  am  utterly  unable  to  see  in  what  essential  thing  the 


A  UNIVERSAL  QUESTION, \ 


23 


condition  of  the  Irish  peasant  would  be  a  whit  improved 
were  Ireland  as  rich  as  England,  and  her  industries  as 
diversified.  For  the  Irish  peasant  is  not  to  be  compared 
with  the  English  tenant-farmer,  who  is  really  a  capital¬ 
ist,  but  with  the  English  agricultural  laborer  and  the 
lowest  class  of  factory  operatives.  Surely  their  condi¬ 
tion  is  not  so  much  better  than  that  of  the  Irish  peasant 
as  to  make  a  difference  worth  talking  about.  On  the 
contrary,  miserable  as  is  the  condition  of  the  Irish  peas¬ 
antry,  sickening  as  are  the  stories  of  their  suffering,  I  am 
inclined  to  think  that  for  the  worst  instances  of  human 
degradation  one  must  go  to  the  reports  that  describe 
the  condition  of  the  laboring  poor  of  England,  rather 
than  to  the  literature  of  Irish  misery.  For  there  are 
three  things  for  which,  in  spite  of  their  poverty  and 
wretchedness  and  occasional  famine,  the  very  poorest 
of  Irish  peasants  are  by  all  accounts  remarkable — the 
physical  vigor  of  their  men,  the  purity  of  their  women, 
and  the  strength  of  the  family  affections.  This,  to  put 
it  mildly,  cannot  be  said  of  large  classes  of  the  labor- 
ing  populations  of  England  and  Scotland.  In  those 
rich  manufacturing  districts  are  classes  stunted  and  de¬ 
teriorated  physically  by  want  and  unwholesome  employ-  ? 
ments  ;  classes  in  which  the  idea  of  female  virtue  is  all 
but  lost,  and  the  family  affections  all  but  trodden  out. 

But  it  is  needless  to  compare  sufferings  and  measure 
miseries.  I  merely  wish  to  correct  that  impression 
which  leads  so  many  people  to  talk  and  write  as  though 
rent  and  land  tenures  related  solely  to  agriculture  and 
to  agricultural  communities.  Nothing  could  be  more  er¬ 
roneous.  Land  is  necessary  to  all  production,  no  mat¬ 
ter  what  be  its  kind  or  form  ;  land  is  the  standing-place, 
the  workshop,  the  storehouse  of  labor ;  it  is  to  the  hu¬ 
man  being  the  only  means  by  which  he  can  obtain  ac¬ 
cess  to  the  material  universe  or  utilize  its  powers.  With¬ 
out  land  man  cannot  exist.  To  whom  the  ownership 
of  land  is  given,  to  him  is  given  the  virtual  ownership 
of  the  men  who  must  live  upon  it.  When  this  neces¬ 
sity  is  absolute,  then  does  he  necessarily  become  their 
absolute  master.  And  just  as  this  point  is  neared — that 
is  to  say,  just  as  competition  increases  the  demand  for 
land — just  in  that  degree  does  the  power  of  taking  a 
larger  and  larger  share  of  the  earnings  of  labor  increase. 


24 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


It  is  this  power  that  gives  land  its  value  ;  this  is  the 
power  that  enables  the  owner  of  valuable  land  to  reap 
where  he  has  not  sown — to  appropriate  to  himself  wealth 
which  he  has  had  no  share  in  producing.  Rent  is  al¬ 
ways  the  devourer  of  wages.  The  owner  of  city  land 
takes,  in  the  rents  he  receives  for  his  land,  the  earnings 
of  labor  just  as  clearly  as  does  the  owner  of  farming 
land.  And  whether  he  be  working  in  a  garret,  ten 
stories  above  the  street,  or  in  a  mining  drift  thousands 
of  feet  below  the  earth’s  surface,  it  is  the  competition 
for  the  use  of  land  that  ultimately  determines  what  pro¬ 
portion  of  the  produce  of  his  labor  the  laborer  will  get 
for  himself.  This  is  the  reason  why  modern  progress 
does  not  tend  to  extirpate  poverty  ;  this  is  the  reason 
why,,  with  all  the  inventions  and  improvements  and 
economies  which  so  enormously  increase  productive 
power,  wages  everywhere  tend  to  the  minimum  of  a 
bare  living.  The  cause  that  in  Ireland  produces  pov¬ 
erty  and  distress — the  ownership  by  some  of  the  people  of 
the  land  on  which  and  from  which  the  whole  people  must 
live — everywhere  else  produces  the  same  results.  It  is 
this  that  produces  the  hideous  squalor  of  London  and 
Glasgow  slums  ;  it  is  this  that  makes  want  jostle  luxury 
in  the  street  of  rich  New  York,  that  forces  little  chil¬ 
dren  to  monotonous  and  stunting  toil  in  Massachusetts 
mills,  and  that  fills  the  highways  of  our  newest  States 
with  tramps. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

PROPOSED  REMEDIES. 

The  facts  we  have  been  considering  give  to  the  Irish 
agitation  a  significance  and  dignity  that  no  effort  for  the 
redress  of  merely  local  grievances,  no  struggle  for  mere 
national  independence  could  have.  As  the  cause  which 
produces  Irish  distress  exists  everywhere  throughout 
modern  civilization,  and  everywhere  produces  the  same 
results,  the  question  as  to  what  measures  will  fully  meet 
the  case  of  Ireland  has  for  us  not  merely  a  speculative 
and  sentimental  interest,  but  a  direct  and  personal  in¬ 
terest. 


PROPOSED  REMEDIES. 


25 


For  a  year  and  more  the  English  journals  and  maga¬ 
zines  have  been  teeming  with  articles  on  the  Irish  Land 
Question  ;  but,  among  all  the  remedies  proposed,  even 
by  men  whose  reputation  is  that  of  clear  thinkers  and 
advanced  Liberals,  I  have  seen  nothing  which  shows  any 
adequate  grasp  of  the  subject.  And  this  is  true  also  of 
the  measures  proposed  by  the  agitators,  so  far  as  they 
have  proposed  any.  They  are  illogical  and  insufficient 
to  the  last  degree.  They  neither  disclose  any  clear 
principle  nor  do  they  aim  at  any  result  worth  the  strug- 
gle. 

From  the  most  timid  to  the  most  radical,  these  schemes 
are  restricted  to  one  or  more  of  the  following  proposi¬ 
tions  : 

ist.  To  abolish  entails  and  primogenitures  and  other 
legal  difficulties  in  the  way  of  sales. 

2d.  To  legalize  and  extend  tenant-right. 

3d.  To  establish  tribunals  of  arbitrament  which  shall 
decide  upon  appeal  the  rent  to  be  paid. 

4th.  To  have  the  State  buy  out  the  landlords  and  sell 
again  on  time  to  the  tenants. 

The  first  of  these  propositions  is  good  in  itself.  To 
make  the  transfer  of  land  easy  would  be  to  remove  ob¬ 
stacles  which  prevent  its  passing  into  the  hands  of  those 
who  would  make  the  most  out  of  it.  But,  so  far  as  this 
will  have  any  effect  at  all,  it  will  not  be  toward  giving 
the  Irish  tenants,  more  merciful  landlords  ;  nor  yet  will 
it  be  to  the  diffusion  of  landed  property.  Those  who 
think  so  shut  their  eyes  to  the  fact  that  the  tendency  of 
the  time  is  to  concentration. 

As  for  the  propositions  which  look  in  various  forms 
to  the  establishment  of  tenant-right,  it  is  to  be  observed 
that,  in  so  far  as  they  go  beyond  giving  the  tenant  surety 
for  his  improvements,  they  merely  carve  out  of  the  es¬ 
tate  of  the  landlord  an  estate  for  the  tenant.  Even  if  the 
proposal  to  empower  the  courts,  in  cases  of  dispute,  to 
decide  what  is  a  fair  rent  were  to  amount  to  anything 
(and  the  Land  Leaguers  say  it  would  not),  the  fixing  of 
a  lower  rent  as  the  share  of  the  landlord  would  merely 
enable  the  tenant  to  charge  a  higher  price  to  his  suc¬ 
cessor.  Whatever  might  thus  be  done  for  present  agri¬ 
cultural  tenants  would  be  of  no  use  to  future  tenants, 
and  nothing  whatever  would  be  done  for  the  masses  of 


26 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


the  people.  In  fact,  that  the  effect  would  be  to  increase 
rent  in  the  aggregate  there  can  be  no  doubt.  What¬ 
ever  modification  might  be  made  in  the  landlord’s  de¬ 
mands,  the  sum  which  the  outgoing  tenant  would  ask 
would  be  very  certain  to  be  all  he  could  possibly  get 
so  that  rent  in  the  aggregate,  instead  of  being  dimin¬ 
ished,  would  be  screwed  up  to  the  full  competition  or 
rack-rent  standard. 

What  seem  to  be  considered  the  most  radical  propo¬ 
sitions  yet  made  are  those  for  the  creation  of  a  “  peas¬ 
ant  proprietary” — the  State  to  buyout  the  landlords 
and  resell  to  the  tenants,  for  annual  payments  extend¬ 
ing  over  a  term  of  years,  and  covering  principal  and  in¬ 
terest.  Waiving  all  practical  difficulties,  and  they  are 
very  great,  what  could  thus  be  accomplished  ?  Nothing 
real  and  permanent.  For  not  merely  is  this,  too,  but  a 
partial  measure,  which  could  not  improve  the  condition 
of  the  masses  of  the  people  or  help  those  most  needing 
help,  but  no  sooner  were  the  lands  thus  divided  than  a 
process  of  concentration  would  infallibly  set  in  which 
would  be  all  the  more  rapid  from  the  fact  that  the  new 
landholders  would  be  heavily  mortgaged.  The  ten¬ 
dency  to  concentration  which  has  so  steadily  operated 
in  Great  Britain,  and  is  so  plainly  showing  itself  in  our 
new  States,  must  operate  in  Ireland,  and  would  imme¬ 
diately  begin  to  weld  together  again  the  little  patches 
of  the  newly  created  peasant  proprietors.  The  tendency 
of  the  time  is  against  peasant  proprietorships  ;  it  is  in 
everything  to  concentration,  not  to  separation.  The 
tendency  which  has  wiped  out  the  small  landowners, 
the  boasted  yeomanry,  of  England — which  in  our  new 
States  is  uniting  the  quarter-sections  of  preemption  and 
homestead  settlers  into  great  farms  of  thousands  of  acres 
— is  already  too  strong  to  be  resisted,  and  is  constantly 
becoming  stronger  and  more  penetrating.  For  it  springs 
from  the  inventions  and  improvements  and  economies 

A 

which  are  transforming  modern  industry — the  same  in¬ 
fluences  which  are  concentrating  population  in  large 
cities,  business  into  the  hands  of  great  houses,  and  for 
the  blacksmith  making  his  own  nails  or  the  weaver  work¬ 
ing  his  own  loom  substitutes  the  factory  of  the  great  cor¬ 
poration. 

That  a  great  deal  that  the  English  advocates  of  peas- 


PROPOSED  REMEDIES. 


27 


ant  proprietorship  have  to  say  about  the  results  of  their 
favorite  system  in  continential  Europe  is  not  borne  out 
by  the  facts,  any  one  who  chooses  to  look  over  the  tes¬ 
timony  may  see.  But  it  is  useless  to  discuss  that. 
Peasant  proprietorship  in  continental  Europe  is  a  sur¬ 
vival.  It  exists  only  among  populations  which  have  not 
felt  fully  the  breath  of  the  new  era.  It  continues  to 
exist  only  by  virtue  of  conditions  which  do  not  obtain 
in  Ireland.  The  Irish  peasant  is  not  the  French  or 
Belgian  peasant.  He  is  in  the  habit  of  having  very 
“  long  families,”  they  very  short  ones.  He  has  become 
familiar  with  the  idea  of  emigrating;  they  have  not. 
He  can  hardly  be  expected  to  have  acquired  those 
habits  of  close  economy  and  careful  forethought  for 
which  they  are  so  remarkable  ;  and  there  are  various 
agencies,  among  which  are  to  be  counted  the  national 
schools  and  the  reaction  from  America,  that  have  roused 
in  him  aspirations  and  ambitions  which  would  prevent 
him  from  continuing  to  water  his  little  patch  with  his 
sweat,  as  do  the  French  and  Belgian  peasant  proprie¬ 
tors,  when  he  could  sell  it  for  enough  to  emigrate. 
Peasant  proprietorship,  like  that  of  France  and  Belgium, 
might  possibly  have  been  instituted  in  Ireland  some 
time  ago,  before  the  railroad  and  the  telegraph  and  the 
national  schools  and  the  establishment  of  the  steam 
bridge  across  the  Atlantic.  But  to  do  it  now  to  any 
extent,  and  with  any  permanency,  seems  to  me  about 
as  practicable  as  to  go  back  to  handloom  weaving  in 
Manchester.  Much  more  in  accordance  with  modern 
tendencies  is  the  notice  I  have  recently  seen  of  the 
formation  of  a  company  to  buy  up  land  in  Southern 
Ireland,  and  cultivate  it  on  a  large  scale  ;  for  to  pro¬ 
duction  on  a  large  scale  modern  processes  more  and 
more  strongly  tend.  It  is  not  merely  the  steam-plow 
and  harvesting  machinery  that  make  the  cultivation 
of  the  large  field  more  profitable  than  that  of  the  small 
one ;  it  is  the  railroad,  the  telegraph,  the  manifold 
inventions  of  all  sorts.  Even  butter  and  cheese  are 
now  made  and  chickens  hatched  and  fattened  in  fac¬ 
tories. 

But  the  fatal  defect  of  all  these  schemes  as  remedial 
measures  is,  that  they  do  not  go  to  the  cause  of  the  dis¬ 
ease,  What  they  propose  to  do,  they  propose  to  do 


28 


TILE  LAND  QUESTION. 


merely  for  one  class  of  the  Irish  people — the  agricultu* 
ral  tenants.  Now,  the  agricultural  tenants  are  not  so 
large  nor  so  poor  a  class  (among  them  are  in  fact  many 
large  capitalist  farmers  of  the  English  type)  as  the  ag¬ 
ricultural  laborers,  while  besides  these  there  are  the 
laborers  of  other  kinds — the  artisans,  operatives,  and 
poorer  classes  of  the  cities.  What  extension  of  tenant- 
right  or  conversion  of  tenant-farmers  into  partial  or 
absolute  proprietors  is  to  benefit  them  ?  Even  if 
the  number  of  owners  of  Irish  soil  could  thus  be  in¬ 
creased,  the  soil  of  Ireland  would  still  be  in  the  hands 
of  a  class,  though  of  a  somewhat  larger  class.  And  the 
spring  of  Irish  misery  would  be  untouched.  Those  who 
had  merely  their  labor  would  be  as  badly  off  as  now,  if 
not  in  some  respects  worse  off.  Rent  would  soon  de¬ 
vour  wages,  and  the  injustice  involved  in  the  present 
system  would  be  intrenched  by  the  increase  in  the  num¬ 
ber  who  seemingly  profit  by  it. 

It  is  that  peasant  proprietors  would  strengthen  the 
existing  system  that  makes  schemes  for  creating  them 
so  popular  among  certain  sections  of  the  propertied 
classes  of  Great  Britain.  This  is  the  ground  on  which 
these  schemes  are  largely  urged.  These  small  land- 
owners  are  desired  that  they  may  be  used  as  a  buffer 
and  bulwark  against  any  questioning  of  the  claims  of 
the  larger  owners.  They  would  be  put  forward  to  resist 
the  shock  of  “agrarianism,”  just  as  the  women  are  put 
forward  in  resistance  to  the  process-servers.  “What! 
do  you  propose  to  rob  these  poor  peasants  of  their  little 
homesteads  ?  ”  would  be  the  answer  to  any  one  who  pro¬ 
posed  to  attack  the  system  under  which  the  larger  land¬ 
holders  draw  millions  annually  from  the  produce  of 
labor. 

And  here  is  the  danger  in  the  adoption  of  measures 
not  based  upon  correct  principles.  They  not  only  fail 
to  do  any  real  and  permanent  good,  but  they  make 
proper  measures  more  difficult.  Even  if  a  majority  of 
the  people  of  Ireland  were  made  the  owners  of  the  soil, 
the  injustice  to  the  minority  would  be  as  great  as  now, 
and  wages  would  still  tend  to  the  minimum,  which  in 
good  times  means  a  bare  living,  and  in  bad  times  means 
starvation.  Even  were  it  possible  to  cut  up  the  soil  of 
Ireland  into  those  little  patches  into  which  the  soil  of 


WHOSE  LAND  IS  IT* 


29 


France  and  Belgium  is  cut  in  the  districts  where  the 
inorcellement  prevails,  this  would  not  be  the  attainment 
of  a  just  and  healthy  social  state.  But  it  would  make 
the  attainment  of  a  just  and  healthy  social  state  much 
more  difficult. 


CHAPTER  V. 

WHOSE  LAND  IS  IT? 

What,  then,  is  the  true  solution  of  the  Irish  problem  ? 
The  answer  is  as  important  to  other  countries  as  to  Ire¬ 
land,  for  the  Irish  problem  is  but  a  local  phase  of  the 
great  problem  which  is  everywhere  pressing  upon  the 
civilized  world. 

With  the  leaders  of  the  Irish  movement,  the  question 
is,  of  course,  not  merely  what  ought  to  be  done,  but 
what  can  be  done.  But,  to  a  clear  understanding  of  the 
whole  subject,  the  question  of  principle  must  necessari¬ 
ly  precede  that  of  method.  We  must  decide  where  we 
want  to  go  before  we  can  decide  what  is  the  best  road 
to  take. 

The  first  question  that  naturally  arises  is  that  of 
right.  Among  whatever  kind  of  people  such  a  matter 
as  this  is  discussed,  the  question  of  right  is  sure  to  be 
raised.  This,  to  me,  seems  a  very  significant  thing  ;  for 
I  believe  it  to  spring  from  nothing  less  than  a  univer¬ 
sal  perception  of  the  human  mind — a  perception  often 
dim  and  vague,  yet  still  a  universal  perception,  that  jus¬ 
tice  is  the  supreme  law  of  the  universe,  so  that,  as  a 
short  road  to  what  is  best,  we  instinctively  ask  what  is 
right  ? 

Now,  what  are  the  rights  of  this  case?  To  whom 
rightfully  does  the  soil  of  Ireland  belong?  Who  are 
justly  entitled  to  its  use*and  to  all  the  benefits  that  flow 
from  its  use  ?  Let  us  settle  this  question  clearly  and 
decisively,  before  we  attempt  anything  else. 

Let  me  go  to  the  heart  of  this  question  by  asking  an¬ 
other  question  :  Has  or  has  not  the  child  born  in  Ire¬ 
land  a  right  to  live  ?  There  can  be  but  one  answer,  for 
no  one  would  contend  that  it  was  right  to  drown  Irish 


3° 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


babies,  or  that  any  human  law  could  make  it  right 
Well,  then,  if  every  human  being  born  in  Ireland  has  a 
right  to  live  in  Ireland,  these  rights  must  be  equal.  If 
each  one  has  a  right  to  live,  then  no  one  can  have  any 
better  right  to  live  than  any  other  one.  There  can  be 
no  dispute  about  this.  No  one  will  contend  that  it  would 
be  any  less  a  crime  to  drown  a  baby  of  an  Irish  peasant 
woman  than  it  would  be  to  drown  the  baby  of  the  proud¬ 
est  duchess,  or  that  a  law  commanding  the  one  would 
be  any  more  justifiable  than  a  law  commanding  the 
other. 

Since,  then,  all  the  Irish  people  have  the  same  equal 
right  to  life,  it  follows  that  they  must  all  have  the  same 
equal  right  to  the  land  of  Ireland.  If  they  are  all  in 
Ii  eland  by  the  same  equal  permission  of  Nature,  so  that 
no  one  of  them  can  justly  set  up  a  superior  claim  to  life 
than  any  other  one  of  them  ;  so  that  all  the  rest  of  them 
could  not  justly  say  to  any  one  of  them,  “  You  have  not 
the  same  right  to  live  as  we  have  ;  therefore  we  will 
pitch  you  out  of  Ireland  into  the  sea!”  then  they  must 
all  have  the  same  equal  rights  to  the  elements  which 
Nature  has  provided  for  the  sustaining  of  life — to  air, 
to  water,  and  to  land.  For  to  deny  the  equal  right  to 
the  elements  necessary  to  the  maintaining  of  life  is  to 
deny  the  equal  right  to  life.  Any  law  that  said,  “  Cer¬ 
tain  babies  have  no  right  to  the  soil  of  Ireland  ;  there¬ 
fore  they  shall  be  thrown  off  the  soil  of  Ireland  would 
be  precisely  equivalent  to  a  law  that  said,  “  Certain 
babies  have  no  right  to  live  ;  therefore  they  shall  be 
thrown  into  the  sea.”  And  as  no  law  or  custom  or 
agreement  can  justify  the  denial  of  the  equal  right  to 
life,  so  no  law  or  custom  or  agreement  can  justify  the 
denial  of  the  equal  right  to  land. 

It  therefore  follows,  from  the  very  fact  of  their  exist¬ 
ence,  that  the  right  of  each  one  of  the  people  of  Ireland 
to  an  equal  share  in  the  land  of  Ireland  is  equal  and  in¬ 
alienable  :  that  is  to  say,  that  the  use  and  benefit  of  the 
land  of  Ireland  belong  rightfully  to  the  whole  people  of 
Ireland,  to  each  one  as  much  as  to  every  other;  to  no 
one  more  than  to  any  other — not  to  some  individuals, 
to  the  exclusion  of  other  individuals  ;  not  to  one  class,  to 
the  exclusion  of  other  classes  ;  not  to  landlords,  not 
to  tenants,  not  to  cultivators,  but  to  the  whole  people. 


LANDLORDS'  RIGHT  IS  LABOR'S  WRONG. 


31 


“  This  right  is  irrefutable  and  indefeasible.  It  per¬ 
tains  to  and  springs  from  the  fact  of  existence,  the  right 
to  live.  No  law,  no  covenant,  no  agreement,  can  bar 
it.  One  generation  cannot  stipulate  away  the  rights 
of  another  generation.  If  the  whole  people  of  Ireland 
were  to  unite  in  bargaining  away  their  rights  in  the 
land,  how  could  they  justly  bargain  away  the  right  of 
the  child  who  the  next  moment  is  born?  No  one  can 
bargain  away  what  is  not  his ;  no  one  can  stipulate 
away  the  rights  of  another.  And  if  the  new-born  infant 
has  an  equal  right  to  life,  then  has  it  an  equal  right  to 
land.  Its  warrant,  which  comes  direct  from  Nature, 
and  which  sets  aside  all  human  laws  or  title-deeds,  is  the 
fact  that  it  is  born. 

Here  we  have  a  firm,  self-apparent  principle  from 
which  we  may  safely  proceed.  The  land  of  Ireland 
does  not  belong  to  one  individual  more  than  to  another 
individual,  to  one  class  more  than  to  another  class  ;  to 
one  generation  more  than  to  the  generations  that  come 
after.  It  belongs  to  the  whole  people  who  at  the  time 
exist  upon  it. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

landlords'  right  is  labor’s  wrong. 

I  do  not  dwell  upon  this  principle  because  it  has  not 
)ret  been  asserted.  I  dwell  upon  it  because,  although 
it  has  been  asserted,  no  proposal  to  carry  it  out  has  yet 
been  made.  The  cry  has  indeed  gone  up  that  the  land 
of  Ireland  belongs  to  the  people  of  Ireland,  but  there 
the  recognition  of  the  principle  has  stopped.  To  say 
that  the  land  of  Ireland  belongs  to  the  people  of  Ire’ 
land,  and  then  merely  to  ask  that  rents  shall  be  reduced, 
or  that  tenant-right  be  extended,  or  that  the  State  shall 
buy  the  land  from  one  class  and  sell  it  to  another  class, 
is  utterly  illogical  and  absurd. 

Either  the  land  of  Ireland  rightfully  belongs  to  the 
Irish  landlords,  or  it  rightfully  belongs  to  the  Irish 
people  ;  there  can  be  no  middle  ground.  If  it  right' 
fully  belongs  to  the  landlords,  then  is  the  whole  agita- 


32 


THE  LAND  QUESTION 


tion  wrong,  and  every  scheme  for  interfering  in  any 
way  with  the  landlords  is  condemned.  If  the  land 
rightfully  belongs  to  the  landlords,  then  it  is  nobody 
else’s  business  what  they  do  with  it,  or  what  rent  they 
charge  for  it,  or  where  or  how  they  spend  the  money 
they  draw  from  it,  and  whoever  does  not  want  to  live 
upon  it  on  the  landlords’  terms  is  at  perfect  liberty  to 
starve  or  emigrate.  But  if,  on  the  contrary,  the  land 
of  Ireland  rightfully  belongs  to  the  Irish  people,  then 
the  only  logical  demand  is,  not  that  the  tenants  shall 
be  made  joint  owners  with  the  landlords,  not  that  it  be 
bought  from  a  smaller  class  and  sold  to  a  larger  class, 
but  that  it  be  resumed  by  the  whole  people.  To  pro¬ 
pose  to  pay  the  landlords  for  it  is  to  deny  the  right  of 
the  people  to  it.  The  real  fight  for  Irish  rights  must 
be  made  outside  of  Ireland  ;  and,  above  all  things,  the 
Irish  agitators  ought  to  take  a  logical  position,  based 
upon  a  broad,  clear  principle  which  can  be  everywhere 
understood  and  appreciated.  To  ask  for  tenant-right 
or  peasant  proprietorship  is  not  to  take  such  a  position  ; 
to  concede  that  the  landlords  ought  to  be  paid  is  to 
utterly  abandon  the  principle  that  the  land  belongs 
rightfully  to  the  people. 

To  admit,  as  even  the  most  radical  of  the  Irish  agita¬ 
tors  seem  to  admit,  that  the  landlords  should  be  paid 
the  value  of  their  lands,  is  to  deny  the  rights  of  the 
people.  It  is  an  admission  that  the  agitation  is  an  in¬ 
terference  with  the  just  rights  of  property.  It  is  to  ig¬ 
nore  the  only  principle  on  which  the  agitation  can  be 
justified,  and  on  which  it  can  gather  strength  for  the 
accomplishment  of  anything  real  and  permanent.  To 
admit  this  is  to  admit  that  the  Irish  people  have  no 
more  right  to  the  soil  of  Ireland  than  any  outsider. 
For,  any  outsider  can  go  to  Ireland  and  buy  land,  if  he 
will  give  its  market  value.  To  propose  to  buy  out  the 
landlords  is  to  propose  to  continue  the  present  injustice 
in  another  form.  They  would  get  in  interest  on  the 
debt  created  what  they  now  get  in  rent.  They  would 
still  have  a  lien  upon  Irish  labor. 

And  why  should  the  landlords  be  paid?  If  the  land 
of  Ireland  belongs  of  natural  right  to  the  Irish  people, 
what  valid  claim  for  payment  can  be  set  up  by  the  land¬ 
lords  ?  No  one  will  contend  that  the  land  is  theirs  of 


LANDLORDS'  RIGHT  LS  LABOR'S  WRONG. 


33 


natural  right,  for  the  day  has  gone  by  when  men  could 
be  told  that  the  Creator  of  the  universe  intended  his 
bounty  for  the  exclusive  use  and  benefit  of  a  privileged 
class  of  his  creatures — that  he  intended  a  few  to  roll  in 
luxury  while  their  fellows  toiled  and  starved  for  them. 
The  claim  of  the  landlords  to  the  land  rests  not  on  nat¬ 
ural  right,  but  merely  on  municipal  law — on  municipal 
law  which  contravenes  natural  right.  And,  whenever 
the  sovereign  power  changes  municipal  law  so  as  to  con¬ 
form  to  natural  right,  what  claim  can  they  assert  to  com¬ 
pensation  ?  Some  of  them  bought  their  lands,  it  is  true  ; 
but  they  got  no  better  title  than  the  seller  had  to  give. 
And  what  are  these  titles  ?  Titles  based  on  murder  and 
robbery,  on  blood  and  rapine — titles  which  rest  on  the 
most  atrocious  and  wholesale  crimes.  Created  by  force 
and  maintained  by  force,  they  have  not  behind  them  the 
first  shadow  of  right.  That  Henry  II.  and  James  I.  and 
Cromwell  and  the  Long  Parliament  had  the  power  to 
give  and  grant  Irish  lands  is  true  ;  but  will  any  one  con¬ 
tend  they  had  the  right  ?  Will  any  one  contend  that  in 
all  the  past  generations  there  has  existed  on  the  British 
Isles  or  anywhere  else  any  human  being,  or  any  num¬ 
ber  of  human  beings,  who  had  the  right  to  say  that  in  the 
year  1881  the  great  mass  of  Irishmen  should  be  compelled 
to  pay — in  many  cases  to  residents  of  England,  France, 
or  the  United  States — for  the  privilege  of  living  in  their 
native  country  and  making  a  living  from  their  native 
soil?  Even  if  it  be  said  that  might  makes  right ;  even 
if  it  be  contended  that  in  the  twelfth,  or  seventeenth,  or 
eighteenth  century  lived  men  who,  having  the  power, 
had  therefore  the  right,  to  give  away  the  soil  of  Ireland, 
it  cannot  be  contended  that  their  right  went  further 
than  their  power,  or  that  their  gifts  and  grants  are 
binding  on  the  men  of  the  present  generation.  No  one 
can  urge  such  a  preposterous  doctrine.  And,  if  might 
makes  right,  then  the  moment  the  people  get  power  to 
take  the  land  the  rights  of  the  present  landholders  utter¬ 
ly  cease,  and  any  proposal  to  compensate  them  is  a  pro¬ 
posal  to  do  a  fresh  wrong. 

Should  it  be  urged  that,  no  matter  on  what  they  orig¬ 
inally  rest,  the  lapse  of  time  has  given  to  the  legal 
owners  of  Irish  land  a  title  of  which  they  cannot  now 
be  justly  deprived  without  compensation,  it  is  sufficient 

3 


34 


THE  LAND  QUEST  I  OK. 


to  ask,  with  Herbert  Spencer,  at  what  rate  per  annum 
wrong  becomes  right  ?  Even  the  shallow  pretence  that 
the  acquiescence  of  society  can  vest  in  a  few  the  exclu¬ 
sive  right  to  that  element  on  which  and  from  which 
Nature  has  ordained  that  all  must  live,  cannot  be  urged 
in  the  case  of  Ireland.  For  the  Irish  people  have  never  ac¬ 
quiesced  in  their  spoliation,  unless  the  bound  and  gagged 
victim  may  be  said  to  acquiesce  in  the  robbery  and  mal¬ 
treatment  which  he  cannot  prevent.  Though  the  memory 
of  their  ancient  rights  in  the  land  of  their  country  may 
have  been  utterly  stamped  out  among  the  people  of  Eng¬ 
land,  and  have  been  utterly  forgotten  among  their  kin  on 
this  side  of  the  sea,  it  has  long  survived  among  the  Irish. 
If  the  Irish  people  have  gone  hungry  and  cold  and  ignor¬ 
ant,  if  they  have  been  evicted  from  lands  on  which  their 
ancestors  had  lived  from  time  immemorial,  if  they  have 
been  forced  to  emigrate  or  to  starve,  it  has  not  been  for  the 
want  of  protest.  They  have  protested  all  they  could  ; 
they  have  struggled  all  they  could.  It  has  been  but  su¬ 
perior  force  that  has  stifled  their  protests  and  made 
their  struggles  vain.  In  a  blind,  dumb  way,  they  are  pro¬ 
testing  now  and  struggling  now,  though  even  if  their 
hands  were  free  they  might  not  at  first  know  how  to 
untie  the  Knots  in  the  cords  that  bind  them.  But  acqui¬ 
esce  they  never  have. 

Yet,  even  supposing  they  had  acquiesced,  as  in  their 
ignorance  the  working  classes  of  such  countries  as  Eng¬ 
land  and  the  United  States  now  acquiesce,  in  the  iniq¬ 
uitous  system  which  makes  the  common  birthright  of 
all  the  exclusive  property  of  some.  What  then  ?  Does 
such  acquiescence  turn  wrong  into  right  ?  If  the 
sleeping  traveller  wake  to  find  a  robber  with  his  hand  in 
his  pocket,  is  he  bound  to  buy  the  robber  off — bound 
not  merely  to  let  him  keep  what  he  has  previously 
taken,  but  pay  him  the  full  value  of  all  he  expected  the 
sleep  of  his  victim  to  permit  him  to  get  ?  If  the  stock¬ 
holders  of  a  bank  find  that  for  a  long  term  of  years  their 
cashier  has  been  appropriating  the  lion’s  share  of  the 
profits,  are  they  to  be  told  that  they  cannot  discharge 
him  without  paying  him  for  what  he  might  have  got, 
had  his  peculations  not  been  discovered  ? 


THE  GREAT-GREAT-GRANDSON-  OF  CART.  KIDD. 


55 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  GREAT-GREAT-GRANDSON  OF  CAPTAIN  KIDD. 

I  apologize  to  the  Irish  landlords  and  to  all  othet 
landlords  for  likening  them  to  thieves  and  robbers.  I 
trust  they  will  understand  that  I  do  not  consider  them 
as  personally  worse  than  other  men,  but  that  I  am 
obliged  to  use  such  illustrations  because  no  others  will 
fit  the  case.  I  am  concerned  not  with  individuals,  but 
with  the  system.  What  I  want  to  do  is,  to  point  out  a 
distinction  that  in  the  plea  for  the  vested  rights  of  land- 
owners  is  ignored — a  distinction  which  arises  from  the 
essential  difference  between  land  and  things  that  are  the 
produce  of  human  labor,  and  which  is  obscured  by  our 
habit  of  classing  them  all  together  as  property. 

The  galleys  that  carried  Caesar  to  Britain,  the  accou¬ 
trements  of  his  legionaries,  the  baggage  that  they  car¬ 
ried,  the  arms  that  they  bore,  the  buildings  that  they 
erected  ;  the  scythed  chariots  of  the  ancient  Britons, 
the  horses  that  drew  them,  their  wicker  boats  and  wat¬ 
tled  houses — where  are  they  now?  But  the  land  for 
which  Roman  and  Briton  fought,  there  it  is  still.  That 
British  soil  is  yet  as  fresh  and  as  new  as  it  was  in  the 
days  of  the  Romans.  Generation  after  generation  has 
lived  on  it  since,  and  generation  after  generation  will 
live  on  it  yet.  Now,  here  is  a  very  great  difference. 
The  right  to  possess  and  to  pass  on  the  ownership  of 
things  that  in  their  nature  decay  and  soon  cease  to  be 
is  a  very  different  thing  from  the  right  to  possess  and  to 
pass  on  the  ownership  of  that  which  does  not  decay,  but 
from  which  each  successive  generation  must  live. 

To  show  how  this  difference  between  land  and  such 
other  species  of  property  as  are  properly  styled  wealth 
bears  upon  the  argument  for  the  vested  rights  of  land¬ 
holders,  let  me  illustrate  again. 

Captain  Kidd  was  a  pirate.  He  made  a  business  of 
sailing  the  seas,  capturing  merchantmen,  making  their 
crews  walk  the  plank,  and  appropriating  their  cargoes. 
In  this  way  he  accumulated  much  wealth,  which  he  is 


THE  LAKE  QUESTION \ 


36 

thought  to  have  buried.  But  let  us  suppose,  for  the 
sake  of  the  illustration,  that  he  did  not  bury  his  wealth, 
but  left  it  to  his  legal  heirs,  and  they  to  their  heirs  and 
so  on,  until  at  the  present  day  this  wealth  or  a  part  of 
it  has  come  to  a  great-great-grandson  of  Captain  Kidd. 
Now,  let  us  suppose  that  some  one — say  a  great-great- 
grandson  of  one  of  the  ship-masters  whom  Captain 
Kidd  plundered,  makes  complaint,  and  says:  “This 
man’sgreat-great-grandfather  plundered  my  great-great- 
father  of  certain  things  or  certain  sums,  which  have 
been  transmitted  to  him,  whereas  but  for  this  wrongful 
act  they  would  have  been  transmitted  to  me  ;  therefore, 
I  demand  that  he  be  made  to  restore  them.”  What  would 
society  answer  ? 

Society,  speaking  by  its  proper  tribunals,  and  in  ac¬ 
cordance  with  principles  recognized  among  all  civilized 
nations,  would  say:  “We  cannot  entertain  such  a  de¬ 
mand.  It  may  be  true  that  Mr.  Kidd’s  great-great¬ 
grandfather  robbed  your  great-great-grandfather,  and 
that  as  the  result  of  this  wrong  he  has  got  things  that 
otherwise  might  have  come  to  you.  But  we  cannot  in¬ 
quire  into  occurrences  that  happened  so  long  ago. 
Each  generation  has  enough  to  do  to  attend  to  its  own 
affairs.  If  we  go  to  righting  the  wrongs  and  reopening 
the  controversies  of  our  great-great-grandfathers,  there 
will  be  endless  disputes  and  pretexts  for  dispute.  What 
you  say  may  be  true,  but  somewhere  we  must  draw  the 
line,  and  have  an  end  to  strife.  Though  this  man’s 
great-great-grandfather  may  have  robbed  your  great- 
great-grandfather,  he  has  not  robbed  you.  He  came  into 
possession  of  these  things  peacefully,  and  has  held  them 
peacefully,  and  we  must  take  this  peaceful  possession, 
when  it  has  been  continued  for  a  certain  time,  as  abso¬ 
lute  evidence  of  just  title  ;  for,  were  we  not  to  do  that, 
there  would  be  no  end  to  dispute  and  no  secure  posses¬ 
sion  of  anything. 

Now,  it  is  this  common-sense  principle  that  is  ex¬ 
pressed  in  the  statute  of  limitations — in  the  doctrine  of 
vested  rights.  This  is  the  reason  why  it  is  held — and  as 
to  most  things  held  justly — that  peaceable  possession 
for  a  certain  time  cures  all  defects  of  title. 

But  let  us  pursue  the  illustration  a  little  further  : 

Let  us  suppose  that  Captain  Kidd,  having  established 


THE  GREAT-GREAT-GRANDSON  OF  CART.  KIDD.  37 

a  large  and  profitable  piratical  business,  left  it  to  his 
son,  and  he  to  his  son,  and  so  on,  until  the  great-great- 
grandson,  who  now  pursues  it,  has  come  to  consider  it 
the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world  that  his  ships  should 
roam  the  sea,  capturing  peaceful  merchantmen,  making 
their  crews  walk  the  plank,  and  bringing  home  to  him 
much  plunder,  whereby  he  is  enabled,  though  he  does 
no  work  at  all,  to  live  in  very  great  luxury,  and  look 
down  with  contempt  upon  people  who  have  to  work. 
But  at  last,  let  us  suppose,  the  merchants  get  tired  of 
having  their  ships  sunk  and  their  goods  taken,  and  sail¬ 
ors  get  tired  of  trembling  for  their  lives  every  time  a 
sail  lifts  above  the  horizon,  and  they  demand  of  society 
that  piracy  be  stopped. 

Now,  what  should  society  say  if  Mr.  Kidd  got  indig¬ 
nant,  appealed  to  the  doctrine  of  vested  rights,  and  as¬ 
serted  that  society  was  bound  to  prevent  any  interfer¬ 
ence  with  the  business  that  he  had  inherited,  and  that, 
if  it  wanted  him  to  stop,  it  must  buy  him  out,  paying 
him  all  that  his  business  was  worth — that  is  to  say,  at 
least  as  much  as  he  could  make  in  twenty  years’  success¬ 
ful  pirating,  so  that  if  he  stopped  pirating  he  could  still 
continue  to  live  in  luxury  off  of  the  profits  of  the  mer¬ 
chants  and  the  earnings  of  the  sailors  ? 

What  ought  society  to  say  to  such  a  claim  as  this. 
There  will  be  but  one  answer.  We  will  all  say  that  so¬ 
ciety  should  tell  Mr.  Kidd  that  his  was  a  business  to 
which  the  statute  of  limitations  and  the  doctrine  of 
vested  rights  did  not  apply  ;  that  because  his  father, 
and  his  grandfather,  and  his  great-  and  great-great-grand¬ 
father  pursued  the  business  of  capturing  ships  and 
making  their  crews  walk  the  plank,  was  no  reason  why 
he  should  be  permitted  to  pursue  it.  Society,  we  will 
all  agree,  ought  to  say  he  would  have  to  stop  piracy 
and  stop  it  at  once,  and  that  without  getting  a  cent  for 
stopping. 

Or  supposing  it  had  happened  that  Mr.  Kidd  had 
sold  out  his  piratical  business  to  Smith,  Jones,  or  Rob¬ 
inson,  we  will  all  agree  that  society  ought  to  say  that 
their  purchase  of  the  business  gave  them  no  greater 
right  than  Mr.  Kidd  had. 

We  will  all  agree  that  that  is  what  society  ought  to 
say.  -  Observe,  I  do  not  ask  what  sogiety  would  say. 


38 


THE  LAXD  QUEST  I  OX. 


For,  ridiculous  and  preposterous  as  it  may  appear,  1 
am  satisfied  that,  under  the  circumstances  I  have  sup¬ 
posed,  society  would  not  for  a  long  time  say  what  we 
have  agreed  it  ought  to  say.  Not  only  would  all  the 
Kidds  loudly  claim  that  to  make  them  give  up  their 
business  without  full  recompense  would  be  a  wicked 
interference  with  vested  rights,  but  the  justice  of  this 
claim  would  at  first  be  assumed  as  a  matter  of  course 
by  all  or  nearly  all  the  influential  classes — the  great 
lawyers,  the  able  journalists,  the  writers  for  the  maga¬ 
zines,  the  eloquent  clergymen,  and  the  principal  pro¬ 
fessors  in  the  principal  universities.  Nay,  even  the 
merchants  and  sailors,  when  they  first  began  to  com¬ 
plain,  would  be  so  tyrannized  and  browbeaten  by  this 
public  opinion  that  they  would  hardly  think  of  more 
than  of  buying  out  the  Kidds,  and,  wherever  here  and 
there  any  one  dared  to  raise  his  voice  in  favor  of  step¬ 
ping  piracy  at  once  and  without  compensation,  he 
would  only  do  so  under  penalty  of  being  stigmatized 
as  a  reckless  disturber  and  wicked  foe  of  social  order. 

If  any  one  denies  this,  if  any  one  says  mankind  are 
not  such  fools,  then  I  appeal  to  universal  history  to 
bear  me  witness.  I  appeal  to  the  facts  of  to-day. 

Show  me  a  wrong,  no  matter  how  monstrous,  that 
ever  vet,  among  any  people,  became  ingrafted  in  the 
social  system,  and  I  will  prove  to  you  the  truth  of  what 
I  say. 

The  majority  of  men  do  not  think  ;  the  majority  of 
men  have  to  expend  so  much  energy  in  the  struggle  to 
make  a  living  that  they  do  not  have  time  to  think. 
The  majority  of  men  accept,  as  a  matter  of  course, 
whatever  is.  This  is  what  makes  the  task  of  the  social 
reformer  so  difficult,  his  path  so  hard.  This  is  what 
brings  upon  those  who  first  raise  their  voices  in  behalf 
of  a  great  truth  the  sneers  of  the  powerful  and  the 
curses  of  the  rabble,  ostracism  and  martyrdom,  the  robe 
of  derision  and  the  crown  of  thorns. 

Am  I  not  right  ?  Have  there  not  been  states  of  so¬ 
ciety  in  which  piracy  has  been  considered  the  most  re¬ 
spectable  and  honorable  of  pursuits  ?  Did  the  Roman 
populace  see  anything  more  reprehensible  in  a  gladia¬ 
torial  show  than  we  do  in  a  horse-race  ?  Does  public 
opinion  in  Dahomey  see  anything  reprehensible  in  the 


THE  GREA  T-GREA  T-GRANDSOH  OF  CART.  KIDD.  39 

custom  of  sacrificing  a  thousand  or  two  human  beings 
by  way  of  signalizing  grand  occasions  ?  Are  there  not 
states  of  society  in  which,  in  spite  of  the  natural  pro¬ 
portions  of  the  sexes,  polygamy  is  considered  a  matter 
of  course  ?  Are  there  not  states  of  society  in  which  it 
would  be  considered  the  most  ridiculous  thing  in  the 
world  to  say  that  a  man’s  son  was  more  closely  related 
to  him  than  his  nephew  ?  Are  there  not  states  of  so¬ 
ciety  in  which  it  would  be  considered  disreputable  for 
a  man  to  carry  a  burden  while  a  woman  who  could  stag¬ 
ger  under  it  was  around  ? — states  of  society  in  which 
the  husband  who  did  not  occasionally  beat  his  wife 
would  be  deemed  by  both  sexes  a  weak-minded,  low- 
spirited  fellow  ?  What  would  Chinese  fashionable  so¬ 
ciety  consider  more  outrageous  than  to  be  told  that 
mothers  should  not  be  permitted  to  squeeze  their  daugh¬ 
ters’  feet,  or  Flathead  women  than  being  restrained 
from  tying  a  board  on  their  infants’  skulls  ?  How  long 
has  it  been  since  the  monstrous  doctrine  of  the  divine 
right  of  kings  was  taught  through  all  Christendom  ? 

What  is  the  slave  trade  but  piracy  of  the  worst 
kind  ?  Yet  it  is  not  long  since  the  slave  trade  was 
looked  upon  as  a  perfectly  respectable  business,  afford¬ 
ing  as  legitimate  an  opening  for  the  investment  of  cap¬ 
ital  and  the  display  of  enterprise  as  any  other.  The 
proposition  to  prohibit  it  was  first  looked  upon  as  ridic¬ 
ulous,  then  as  fanatical,  then  as  wicked.  It  was  only 
slowly  and  by  hard  fighting  that  the  truth  in  regard  to 
it  gained  ground.  Does  not  our  very  Constitution  bear 
witness  to  what  I  say  ?  Does  not  the  fundamental  law 
of  the  nfvtion,  adopted  twelve  years  after  the  enunciation 
of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  declare  that  for 
twenty  years  the  slave  trade  shall  not  be  prohibited  nor 
restricted  ?  Such  dominion  had  the  idea  of  vested  in¬ 
terests  over  the  minds  of  those  who  had  already  pro¬ 
claimed  the  inalienable  right  of  man  to  life,  liberty,  and 
the  pursuit  of  happiness  ! 

Is  it  not  but  yesterday  that  in  the  freest  and  greatest 
republic  on  earth,  among  the  people  who  boast  that 
they  lead  the  very  van  of  civilization,  this  doctrine  of 
vested  rights  was  deemed  a  sufficient  justification  for  all 
the  cruel  wrongs  of  human  slavery  ?  Is  it  not  but  yes¬ 
terday,  when  whoever  dared  to  say  that  the  rights  of 


40 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


property  did  not  justly  attach  to  human  beings  ;  when 
whoever  dared  to  deny  that  human  beings  could  not  be 
rightfully  bought  and  sold  like  cattle — the  husband  torn 
from  the  wife  and  the  child  from  the  mother  ;  when 
whoever  denied  the  right  of  whoever  had  paid  his 
money  for  him  to  work  or  whip  his  own  nigger  was 
looked  upon  as  a  wicked  assailant  of  the  rights  of  prop¬ 
erty  ?  Is  it  not  but  yesterday  when  in  the  South  who¬ 
ever  whispered  such  a  thought  took  his  life  in  his  hands  ; 
when  in  the  North  the  abolitionist  was  held  by  the 
churches  as  worse  than  an  infidel,  was  denounced  by 
the  politicians  and  rotten-egged  by  the  mob  ?  I  was 
born  in  a  Northern  State,  I  have  never  lived  in  the 
South,  I  am  not  yet  gray  ;  but  I  well  remember,  as 
every  American  of  middle  age  must  remember,  how 
over  and  over  again  I  have  heard  all  questionings  of 
slavery  silenced  by  the  declaration  that  the  negroes 
were  the  property  of  their  masters,  and  that  to  take 
away  a  man’s  slave  without  payment  was  as  much  a 
crime  as  to  take  away  his  horse  without  payment.  And 
whoever  does  not  remember  that  far  back,  let  him  look 
over  American  literature  previous  to  the  war,  and  say 
whether,  if  the  business  of  piracy  had  been  a  flourish¬ 
ing  business,  it  would  have  lacked  defenders  ?  Let  him 
say  whether  any  proposal  to  stop  the  business  of  piracy 
without  compensating  the  pirates  would  not  have  been 
denounced  at  first  as  a  proposal  to  set  aside  vested 
rights  ? 

But  I  am  appealing  to  other  states  of  society  and  to 
times  that  are  past  merely  to  get  my  readers,  if  I  can, 
out  of  their  accustomed  ruts  of  thought.  The  proof  of 
what  I  assert  about  the  Kidds  and  their  business  is  in 
the  thought  and  speech  of  to-day. 

Here  is  a  system  which  robs  the  producers  of  wealth 
as  remorselessly  and  far  more  regularly  and  systemati¬ 
cally  than  the  pirate  robs  the  merchantman.  Here  is  a 
system  that  steadily  condemns  thousands  to  far  more 
lingering  and  horrible  deaths  than  that  of  walking  the 
plank — to  death  of  the  mind  and  death  of  the  soul,  as 
well  as  death  of  the  body.  These  things  are  undis¬ 
puted.  No  one  denies  that  Irish  pauperism  and  famine 
are  the  direct  results  of  this  land  system,  and  no  one 
who  will  examine  the  subject  will  deny  that  the  chronic 


THE  GREAT-GREAT-GRANDSON  OF  CART.  KIDD.  41 


pauperism  and  chronic  famine  which  everywhere  mark 
our  civilization  are  the  results  of  this  system.  Yet  we 
are  told — nay,  it  seems  to  be  taken  for  granted — that 
this  system  can  not  be  abolished  without  buying  off 
those  who  profit  by  it.  Was  there  ever  more  degrading 
abasement  of  the  human  mind  before  a  fetish  ?  Can 
we  wonder,  as  we  see  it,  at  any  perversion  of  ideas  ? 

Consider  :  is  not  the  parallel  I  have  drawn  a  true  one? 
Is  it  not  just  as  much  a  perversion  of  ideas  to  apply  the 
doctrine  of  vested  rights  to  property  in  land,  when  these 
are  its  admitted  fruits,  as  it  was  to  apply  it  to  property 
in  human  flesh  and  blood  ;  as  it  would  be  to  apply  it  to 
the  business  of  piracy  ?  In  what  does  the  claim  of  the 
Irish  landholders  differ  from  that  of  the  hereditary 
pirate  or  the  man  who  has  bought  out  a  piratical  bus¬ 
iness  ?  “Because  I  have  inherited  or  purchased  the 
business  of  robbing  merchantmen,”  says  the  pirate, 
“therefore  respect  for  the  rights  of  property  must  com¬ 
pel  you  to  let  me  go  on  robbing  ships  and  making 
sailors  walk  the  plank  until  you  buy  me  out.”  “  Be¬ 
cause  we  have  inherited  or  purchased  the  privilege  of 
appropriating  to  ourselves  the  lion’s  share  of  the  pro¬ 
duce  of  labor,”  says  the  landlord,  “therefore  you  must 
continue  to  let  us  do  it,  even  though  poor  wretches 
shiver  with  cold  and  faint  with  hunger,  even  though,  in 
their  poverty  and  misery,  they  are  reduced  to  wallow 
with  the  pigs.”  What  is  the  difference  t 

This  is  the  point  I  want  to  make  clearly  and  distinctly, 
for  it  shows  a  distinction  that  in  current  thought  is  over¬ 
looked.  Property  in  land,  like  property  in  slaves,  is  es¬ 
sentially  different  from  property  in  things  that  are  the 
result  of  labor.  Rob  a  man  or  a  people  of  money,  or 
goods,  or  cattle,  and  the  robbery  is  finished  there  and 
then.  The  lapse  of  time  does  not,  indeed,  change 
wrong  into  right,  but  it  obliterates  the  effects  of  the 
deed.  That  is  done  ;  it  is  over  ;  and,  unless  it  be  very 
soon  righted,  it  glides  away  into  the  past,  with  the  men 
who  were  parties  to  it,  so  swiftly  that  nothing  save  om¬ 
niscience  can  trace  its  effects  ;  and  in  attempting  to 
right  it  we  would  be  in  danger  of  doing  fresh  wrong. 
The  past  is  for  ever  beyond  us.  We  can  neither  punish 
nor  recompense  the  dead.  But  rob  a  people  of  the 
land  on  which  they  must  live,  and  the  robbery  is  con- 


42 


THE  LAND  QUESTION 


tinuous.  It  is  a  fresh  robbery  of  every  succeeding  gen 
eration — a  new  robbery  every  year  and  every  day  ;  it  is 
like  the  robbery  which  condemns  to  slavery  the  children 
of  the  slave.  To  apply  to  it  the  statute  of  limitations, 
to  acknowledge  for  it  the  title  of  prescription,  is  not  to 
condone  the  past  ;  it  is  to  legalize  robbery  in  the  pres¬ 
ent,  to  justify  it  in  the  future.  The  indictment  which 
really  lies  against  the  Irish  landlords  is  not  that  their 
ancestors,  or  the  ancestors  of  their  grantors,  robbed  the 
ancestors  of  the  Irish  people.  That  makes  no  difference. 
“  Let  the  dead  bury  their  dead.”  The  indictment  that 
truly  lies  is  that  here,  now,  in  the  year  1881,  they  rob 
the  Irish  people.  And  shall  we  be  told  that  there  can 
be  a  vested  right  to  continue  such  robbery  ? 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE  ONLY  WAY,  THE  EASY  WAY. 

I  have  dwelt  so  long  upon  this  question  of  compen¬ 
sating  landowners,  not  merely  because  it  is  of  great 
practical  importance,  but  because  its  discussion  brings 
clearly  into  view  the  principles  upon  which  the  land 
question,  in  any  country,  can  alone  be  justly  and  finally 
settled.  In  the  light  of  these  principles  we  see  that 
landowners  have  no  rightful  claim  either  to  the  land  or 
to  compensation  for  its  resumption  by  the  people,  and, 
further  than  that,  we  see  that  no  such  rightful  claim  can 
ever  be  created.  It  would  be  wrong  to  pay  the  present 
landowners  for  “  their  ”  land  at  the  expense  of  the 
people  ;  it  would  likewise  be  wrong  to  sell  it  again  to 
smaller  holders.  It  would  be  wrong  to  abolish  the  pay¬ 
ment  of  rent,  and  to  give  the  land  to  its  present  culti¬ 
vators.  In  the  very  nature  of  things,  land  can  not  right¬ 
fully  be  made  individual  property.  This  principle  is 
absolute.  The  title  of  a  peasant  proprietor  deserves  no 
more  respect  than  the  title  of  a  great  territorial  noble. 
No  sovereign  political  power,  no  compact  or  agreement, 
even  though  consented  to  by  the  whole  population  of 


THE  ONLY  WAY,  THE  EASY  WAY. 


43 


the  globe,  can  give  to  an  individual  a  valid  title  to  the  ex¬ 
clusive  ownership  of  a  square  inch  of  soil.  The  earth  is 
an  entailed  estate — entailed  upon  all  the  generations  of 
the  children  of  men,  by  a  deed  written  in  the  constitution 
of  Nature,  a  deed  that  no  human  proceedings  can  bar, 
and  no  prescription  determine.  Each  succeeding  gen¬ 
eration  has  but  a  tenancy  for  life.  Admitting  that  any 
set  of  men  may  barter  away  their  own  natural  rights 
(and  this  logically  involves  an  admission  of  the  right  of 
suicide),  they  can  no  more  barter  away  the  rights  of  their 
successors  than  they  can  barter  away  the  rights  of  the 
inhabitants  of  other  worlds. 

What  should  be  aimed  at  in  the  settlement  of  the 
Irish  land  question  is  thus  very  clear.  The  “  three  F’s  ” 
are,  what  they  have  already  been  called,  three  frauds  ; 
and  the  proposition  to  create  peasant  proprietorship  is 
no  better.  It  will  not  do  merely  to  carve  out  of  the  es¬ 
tates  of  the  landlords  minor  estates  for  the  tenants  ;  it 
will  not  do  merely  to  substitute  a  larger  for  a  smaller 
class  of  proprietors  ;  it  will  not  do  to  confine  the  settle¬ 
ment  to  agricultural  land,  leaving  to  its  present  possess¬ 
ors  the  land  of  the  towns  and  villages.  None  of  these 
lame  and  impotent  conclusions  will  satisfy  the  demands 
of  justice  or  cure  the  bitter  evils  now  so  apparent.  The 
only  true  and  just  solution  of  the  problem,  the  only  end 
worth  aiming  at,  is  to  make  all  the  land  the  common 
property  of  all  the  people. 

This  principle  conceded,  the  question  of  method 
arises.  How  shall  this  be  done  ?  Nothing  is  easier. 
It  is  merely  necessary  to  divert  the  rent  which  now 
flows  into  the  pockets  of  the  landlords  into  the  common 
treasury  of  the  whole  people.  It  is  not  possible  to  so 
divide  up  the  land  of  Ireland  so  as  to  give  each  family, 
still  less  each  individual,  an  equal  share.  And,  even  if 
that  were  possible,  it  would  not  be  possible  to  maintain 
equality,  for  old  people  are  constantly  dying  and  new 
people  constantly  being  born,  while  the  relative  value 
of  land  is  constantly  changing.  But  it  is  possible  to 
equally  divide  the  rent,  or,  what  amounts  to  the  same 
thing,  to  apply  it  to  purposes  of  common  benefit.  This 
is  the  way,  and  this  is  the  only  way,  in  which  absolute 
justice  can  be  done.  This  is  the  way,  and  this  is  the 
only  way,  in  which  the  equal  right  of  every  man,  woman, 


44 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


and  child  can  be  acknowledged  and  secured.  As  Her¬ 
bert  Spencer  says  of  it :  * 

Such  a  doctrine  is  consistent  with  the  highest  state  of  civilization  ; 
may  be  carried  out  without  involving  a  community  of  goods,  and  need 
cause  no  very  serious  revolution  in  existing  arrangements.  The  change 
required  would  simply  be  a  change  of  landlords.  Separate  ownership 
would  merge  into  the  joint-stock  ownership  of  the  public.  Instead  of 
being  in  the  possession  of  individuals,  the  country  would  be  held  by 
the. great  corporate  body — society.  Instead  of  leasing  his  acres  from 
an  isolated  proprietor,  the  farmer  would  lease  them  from  the  nation. 
Instead  of  paying  his  rent  to  the  agent  of  Sir  John  or  his  Grace,  he 
would  pay  it  to  an  agent  or  deputy  agent  of  the  community.  Stewards 
would  be  public  officials  instead  of  private  ones,  and  tenancy  the  only 
land  tenure.  A  state  of  things  so  ordered  would  be  in  perfect  harmony 
with  the  moral  law.  Under  it,  all  men  would  be  equally  landlords  ;  all 
men  would  be  alike  free  to  become  tenants.  .  .  .  Clearly,  therefore, 
on  such  a  system,  the  earth  might  be  enclosed,  occupied,  and  cultivated, 
in  entire  subordination  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

*  *  » 

Now,  it  is  a  very  easy  thing  to  thus  sweep  away  all 
private  ownership  of  land,  and  convert  all  occupiers 
into  tenants  of  the  State,  by  appropriating  rent.  No 
complicated  laws  or  cumbersome  machinery  is  neces¬ 
sary.  It  is  only  necessary  to  tax  land  up  to  its  full 
value.  Do  that,  and  without  any  talk  about  disposses¬ 
sing  landlords,  without  any  use  of  the  ugly  word  “con¬ 
fiscation,”  without  any  infringement  of  the  just  rights 
of  property,  the  land  would  become  virtually  the  peo¬ 
ple’s,  while  the  landlords  would  be  left  the  absolute  and 
unqualified  possessors  of — their  deeds  of  title  and  con¬ 
veyance  !  They  could  continue  to  call  themselves  land¬ 
lords,  if  they  wished  to,  just  as  that  poor  old  Bourbon, 
the  Comte  de  Chambord,  continues  to  call  himself 
King  of  France  ;  but,  as  what,  under  this  system,  was 
paid  by  the  tenant  would  be  taken  by  the  State,  it  is 
pretty  clear  that  middle-men  would  not  long  survive, 
and  that  very  soon  the  occupiers  of  land  would  come  to 
be  nominally  the  owners,  though,  in  reality,  they  would 
be  the  tenants  of  the  whole  people. 

How  beautifully  this  simple  method  would  satisfy 
every  economic  requirement  ;  how,  freeing  labor  and 
capital  from  the  fetters  that  now  oppress  them  (for  all 
other  taxes  could  be  easily  remitted),  it  would  enor- 


*  “  Social  Statics,”  Chap,  ix.,  sec.  8, 


PRINCIPLE  THE  PEST  POLICY. 


45 


mously  increase  the  production  of  wealth  ;  how  it  would 
make  distribution  conform  to  the  law  of  justice,  dry  up 
the  springs  of  want  and  misery,  elevate  society  from  its 
lowest  stratum,  and  give  all  their  fair  share  in  the  bless¬ 
ings  of  advancing  civilization,  can  perhaps  only  be  fully 
shown  by  such  a  detailed  examination  of  the  whole 
social  problem  as  I  have  made  in  a  book*  which  I  hope 
will  be  read  by  all  the  readers  of  this,  since  in  it  I  go 
over  much  ground  and  treat  many  subjects  which  can 
not  be  even  touched  upon  here.  Nevertheless,  anyone 
can  see  that  to  tax  land  up  to  its  full  rental  value  would 
amount  to  precisely  the  same  thing  as  to  formally  take 
possession  of  it,  and  then  let  it  out  to  the  highest  bid¬ 
ders. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

PRINCIPLE  THE  BEST  POLICY. 

We  have  now  seen  the  point  that  should  be  aimed  at, 
and  the  method  by  which  it  is  to  be  reached.  There  is 
another  branch  of  the  subject  which  practical  men  must 
consider  :  the  political  forces  that  may  be  marshalled  ; 
the  political  resistance  that  must  be  overcome.  It  is 
one  thing  to  work  out  such  a  problem  in  the  closet — to 
demonstrate  its  proper  solution  to  the  satisfaction  of  a 
few  intelligent  readers.  It  is  another  thing  to  solve  it  in 
the  field  of  action,  where  ignorance,  prejudice,  and  pow¬ 
erful  interests  must  be  met. 

It  can  not  be  that  the  really  earnest  men  in  the  Irish 
movement  are  satisfied  with  any  programme  yet  put 
forth.  But  they  are  doubtless  influenced  by  the  fear 
that  the  avowal  of  radical  views  and  aims  would  not 
merely  intensify  present  opposition,  but  frighten  away 
from  their  cause  large  numbers  and  important  influences 
now  with  it.  To  say  nothing  of  English  conservatism, 
there  is  in  Ireland  a  large  class  now  supporting  the 
movement  who  are  morbidly  afraid  of  anything  which 


*  “  Progress  and  Poverty.” 


*6 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


savors  of  “  communism  ”  or  “  socialism,”  while  in  the 
United  States,  whence  much  moral  support  and  pecun¬ 
iary  aid  have  been  derived,  it  is  certain  that  many 
of  those  who  are  now  loudest  in  their  expressions  of 
sympathy  would  slink  away  from  a  movement  which 
avowed  the  intention  of  abolishing  private  property  in 
land.  A  resolution,  expressive  of  sympathy  with  the 
Irish  people  in  their  “  struggle  for  the  repeal  of  oppres¬ 
sive  land  laws  ”  was,  by  a  unanimous  vote  of  the  Na¬ 
tional  House  of  Representatives,  flung  full  in  the  face 
of  the  British  lion.  How  many  votes  would  that  reso¬ 
lution  have  got  had  it  involved  a  declaration  of  hostil¬ 
ity  to  the  institution  of  individual  property  in  land  ? 

I  understand  all  this.  Nevertheless,  I  am  convinced 
that  the  Irish  land  movement  would  gain,  not  lose,  were 
its  earnest  leaders,  disdaining  timid  counsels,  to  boldly 
avow  the  principle  that  the  land  of  Ireland  belongs  of 
right  to  the  whole  people  of  Ireland,  and,  without  both¬ 
ering  about  compensation  to  the  landholders,  to  pro¬ 
pose  its  resumption  by  the  people  in  the  simple  way  I 
have  suggested.  That,  in  doing  this,  they  would  lose 
strength  and  increase  antagonism  in  some  directions  is 
true,  but  they  would  in  other  directions  gain  strength 
and  allay  antagonisms.  And,  while  the  loss  would  con¬ 
stantly  tend  to  diminish,  the  gain  would  constantly  tend 
to  increase.  They  would,  to  use  the  phrase  of  Emerson, 
have  “  hitched  their  wagon  to  a  star.” 

I  admit,  as  will  be  urged  by  those  who  would  hold 
back  from  such  an  avowal  as  I  propose,  that  political 
progress  must  be  by  short  steps  rather  than  by  great 
leaps);  that  those  who  would  have  the  people  follow  them 
readily,  and  especially  those  who  would  enjoy  a  present 
popularity  and  preferment,  must  not  go  too  far  in  ad¬ 
vance  ;  and  that  to  demand  a  little  at  first  is  often  the 
surest  way  to  obtain  much  at  last. 

So  far  as  personal  consideration  is  concerned,  it  is 
only  to  earnest  men  capable  of  feeling  the  inspiration 
of  a  great  principle  that  I  care  to  talk,  or  that  I  can 
hope  to  convince.  To  them  I  wish  to  point  out  that 
caution  is  not  wisdom  when  it  involves  the  ignoring  of 
a  great  principle  ;  that  it  is  not  every  step  that  involves 
progression,  but  only  such  steps  as  are  in  the  right  line 
and  make  easier  the  next ;  that  there  are  strong  forces 


PRINCIPLE  TILE  PEST  POLICY. 


47 


that  wait  but  the  raising  of  the  true  standard  to  rally  on 
its  side. 

Let  the  time-servers,  the  demagogues,  the  compro¬ 
misers,  to  whom  nothing  is  right  and  nothing  is  wrong, 
but  who  are  always  seeking  to  find  some  half-way  house 
between  right  and  wrong — let  them  all  go  their  ways. 
Any  cause  which  can  lay  hold  of  a  great  truth  is  the 
stronger  without  them.  If  the  earnest  men  among  the 
Irish  leaders  abandon  their  present  half-hearted  illogical 
position,  and  take  their  stand  frankly  and  firmly  upon  the 
principle  that  the  youngest  child  of  the  poorest  peasant 
has  as  good  a  right  to  tread  the  soil  and  breathe  the  air 
of  Ireland  as  the  eldest  son  of  the  proudest  duke,  they 
will  have  put  their  fight  on  the  right  line.  Present  de¬ 
feat  will  but  pave  the  way  for  future  victory,  and  each 
step  won  makes  easier  the  next.  Their  position  will  not 
only  be  logically  defensible,  but  will  prove  the  stronger 
the  more  it  is  discussed  ;  for  private  property  in  land, 
which  never  arises  from  the  natural  perceptions  of  men, 
but  springs  historically  from  usurpation  and  robbery, 
is  something  so  utterly  absurd,  so  outrageously  unjust, 
so  clearly  a  waste  of  productive  forces  and  a  barrier  to 
the  most  profitable  use  of  natural  opportunities,  so 
thoroughly  opposed  to  all  sound  maxims  of  public  pol¬ 
icy,  so  glaringly  in  the  way  of  further  progress,  that  it 
is  only  tolerated  because  the  majority  of  men  never 
think  about  it  or  hear  it  questioned.  Once  fairly  ar¬ 
raign  it,  and  it  must  be  condemned  ;  once  call  upon  its 
advocates  to  exhibit  its  claims,  and  their  cause  is  lost  in 
advance.  Jhere  is  to-day  no  political  economist  of 
standing  who  dare  hazard  his  reputation  by  defending 
it  on  economic  grounds1;  there  is  to-day  no  thinker  of 
eminence  who  either  does  not,  like  Herbert  Spencer, 
openly  declare  the  injustice  of  private  property  in  land, 
or  tacitly  make  the  same  admission.  Once  force  the 
discussion  on  this  line,  and  the  Irish  reformers  will  com¬ 
pel  to  their  side  the  most  active  and  powerful  of  the 
men  who  mould  thought. 

And  they  will  not  merely  close  up  their  own  ranks, 
now  in  danger  of  being  broken;  they  will  “carry  the 
war  into  Africa,”  and  make  possible  the  most  powerful 
of  political  combinations. 

It  is  already  beginning  to  be  perceived  that  the  Irish 


48 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


movement,  so  far  as  it  has  yet  gone,  is  merely  in  the  in¬ 
terest  of  a  class  ;  that,  so  far  as  it  has  yet  voiced  any 
demand,  it  promises  nothing  to  the  laboring  and  artisan 
classes.  Its  opponents  already  see  this  opportunity  for 
division,  which,  even  without  their  efforts,  must  soon 
show  itself,  and  which,  now  that  the  first  impulse  of  the 
movement  is  over,  will  the  more  readily  develop.  To 
close  up  its  ranks,  and  hold  them  firm,  so  that,  even 
though  they  be  forced  to  bend,  they  will  not  break  and 
scatter,  it  must  cease  to  be  a  movement  looking  merely 
to  the  benefit  of  the  tenant-farmer,  and  become  a  move¬ 
ment  for  the  benefit  of  the  whole  laboring  class. 

And  the  moment  this  is  done  the  Irish  land  agitation 
assumes  a  new  and  a  grander  phase.  It  ceases  to  be  an 
Irish  movement  ;  it  becomes  but  the  van  of  a  world¬ 
wide  struggle.  Count  the  loss  and  the  gain. 


CHAPTER  X. 

APPEALS  TO  ANIMOSITY. 

The  Land  League  movement,  as  an  Irish  movement, 
has  in  its  favor  the  strength  of  Irish  national  feeling. 
In  assuming  the  radical  ground  I  urge,  it  would  lose 
some  of  this  ;  for  there  are  doubtless  a  considerable 
number  of  Irishmen  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  who 
would  shrink  at  first  from  the  proposal  to  abolish  pri¬ 
vate  property  in  land.  But  all  that  is  worth  having 
would  soon  come  back  to  it.  And  its  strength  would 
be  more  compact  and  intense — animated  by  a  more 
definite  purpose  and  a  more  profound  conviction. 

But  in  ceasing  to  be  a  movement  having  relation  sim¬ 
ply  to  Ireland — in  proclaiming  a  truth  and  proposing  a 
remedy  which  apply  as  well  to  every  other  country — it 
would  allay  opposition,  which,  as  a  mere  local  move¬ 
ment,  it  arouses,  and  brings  to  its  support  powerful 
forces. 

The  powerful  landed  interest  of  England  is  against 
the  movement  anyhow.  The  natural  allies  of  the  Irish 
agitators  are  the  English  working  classes — not  merely 
the  Irishmen  and  sons  of  Irishmen  who,  in  the  larger 


APPEALS  TO  ANIMOSITY. 


49 


English  cities,  are  numerous  enough  to  make  some 
show  and  exert  some  voting  power,  without  being  nu¬ 
merous  enough  to  effect  any  important  result — but  the 
great  laboring  masses  of  Great  Britain.  So  long  as 
merely  Irish  measures  are  proposed,  they  can  not  gain 
the  hearty  support  even  of  the  English  radicals  ;  so 
long  as  race  prejudices  and  hatreds  are  appealed  to, 
counter  prejudices  and  hatreds  must  be  aroused. 

It  is  the  very  madness  of  folly,  it  is  one  of  those  po¬ 
litical  blunders  worse  than  crimes,  to  permit  in  this 
land  agitation  that  indiscriminating  denunciation  of 
England  and  everything  English  which  is  so  common 
at  Land  League  meetings  and  in  the  newspapers  which 
voice  Irish  sentiment.  The  men  who  do  this  may  be 
giving  way  to  a  natural  sentiment ;  but  they  are  most 
effectually  doing  the  work  of  the  real  oppressors  of  Ire¬ 
land.  Were  they  secret  emissaries  of  the  London  po¬ 
lice,  were  they  bribed  with  the  gold  which  the  British 
oligarchy  grinds  out  of  the  toil  of  its  white  slaves  in 
mill  and  mine  and  field,  they  could  not  better  be  doing 
its  work.  “  Divide  and  conquer”  is  the  golden  maxim 
of  the  oppressors  of  mankind.  It  is  by  arousing  race 
antipathies  and  exciting  national  animosities,  by  ap¬ 
pealing  to  local  prejudices  and  setting  people  against 
people,  that  aristocracies  and  despotisms  have  been 
founded  and  maintained.  They  who  would  free  men 
must  rise  above  such  feelings  if  they  would  be  success¬ 
ful.  The  greatest  enemy  of  the  people’s  cause  is  he 
who  appeals  to  national  passion  and  excites  old  hatreds. 
He  is  its  best  friend  who  does  his  utmost  to  bury  them 
out  of  sight.  For  that  action  and  reaction  are  equal  and 
uniform  is  the  law  of  the  moral  as  of  the  physical  world. 
Herein  lies  the  far-reaching  sweep  of  those  sublime 
teachings  that,  after  centuries  of  nominal  acceptance, 
the  so-called  Christian  world  yet  ignores,  and  which 
call  on  us  to  answer  not  revilings  with  revilings,  but  to 
meet  hatred  with  love.  “  For,”  as  say  the  Scriptures 
of  the  Buddhists,  “hatred  never  ceases  by  hatred  at  any 
time  ;  hatred  ceases  by  love  ;  that  is  an  old  rule.”  To 
undiscriminately  denounce  Englishmen  is  simply  to 
arouse  prejudices  and  excite  animosities — to  separate 
forces  that  ought  to  be  united.  To  make  this  the  fight 
of  the  Irish  people  against  the  English  people  is  to 


THE  LAND  QUESTION, 


5° 

doom  it  to  failure.  To  make  it  the  common  cause  ol 
the  people  everywhere  against  a  system  which  every¬ 
where  oppresses  and  robs  them  is  to  make  its  success 
assured.  Had  this  been  made  to  appear,  the  Irish  mem¬ 
bers  would  not  have  stood  alone  when  it  came  to  the 
final  resistance  to  coercion.  Had  this  been  made  to  ap¬ 
pear,  Great  Britain  would  be  in  a  ferment  at  the  pro¬ 
posal  to  give  the  Government  despotic  powers.  If  the 
Irish  leaders  are  wise,  they  may  yet  avail  themselves  of 
the  rising  tide  of  British  democracy.  Let  the  Land 
Leaguers  adopt  the  noble  maxim  of  the  German  So¬ 
cial  Democrats.  Let  them  be  Land  Leaguers  first,  and 
Irishmen  afterward.  Let  them  account  him  an  enemy 
of  their  cause  who  seeks  to  pander  to  prejudice  and 
arouse  hate.  Let  them  arouse  to  a  higher  love  than  the 
mere  love  of  country  ;  to  a  wider  patriotism  than  that 
Which  exhausts  itself  on  one  little  subdivision  of  the  hu¬ 
man  race,  one  little  spot  on  the  great  earth’s  surface  ; 
and  in  this  name,  and  by  this  sign,  call  upon-  their 
brothers,  not  so  much  to  aid  them,  as  to  strike  for 
themselves. 

The  Irish  people  have  the  same  inalienable  right  to 
govern  themselves  as  have  every  other  people  ;  but  the 
full  recognition  of  this  right  need  not  necessarily  in¬ 
volve  separation,  and  to  talk  of  separation  first  is  to 
arouse  passions  that  will  be  utilized  by  the  worst  ene¬ 
mies  of  Ireland.  The  demand  for  the  full  political 
rights  of  the  Irish  people  will  be  the  stronger  if  it  be 
made  to  line  with  and  include  the  demand  for  the  full 
political  rights  of  the  unenfranchised  British  people. 
And  it  must  be  remembered  that  all  the  tendencies  of  the 
time. are  not  to  separation,  but  to  integration  ;  not  to 
independence,  but  to  interdependence.  This  is  observa¬ 
ble  wherever  modern  influences  reach,  and  in  all  things. 
To  attempt  to  resist  it  is  to  attempt  to  turn  back  the 
tide  of  progress. 

It  is  not  with  the  English  people  that  the  Irish  peo¬ 
ple  have  cause  of  quarrel.  It  is  with  the  system  that 
oppresses  both.  That  is  the  thing  to  denounce  ;  that  is 
the  thing  to  fight.  And  it  is  to  be  fought  most  effectu¬ 
ally  by  uniting  the  masses  against  it.  Monarchy,  aris¬ 
tocracy,  landlordism,  would  get  but  a  new  lease  of  life 
by  the  arousing  of  sectional  passions.  The  greatest 


HOW  TO  WIM 


5* 


blow  that  could  be  struck  against  them  would  be,  scru¬ 
pulously  avoiding  everything  that  could  excite  antago¬ 
nistic  popular  feeling,  to  carry  this  land  agitation  into 
Great  Britain,  not  as  a  mere  Irish  question,  but  as  a 
home  question  as  well.  To  proclaim  the  universal  truth 
that  land  is  of  natural  right  common  property  ;  to  aban¬ 
don  all  timid  and  half-way  schemes  which  attempt  to 
compromise  between  justice  and  injustice,  and  to  de¬ 
mand  nothing  more  nor  less  than  a  full  recognition  of 
this  natural  right  would  be  to  do  this.  It  would  inevi¬ 
tably  be  to  put  the  British  masses  upon  inquiry  ;  to  put 
British  landholders  upon  the  defensive,  and  give  them 
more  than  enough  to  do  at  home.  Both  England  and 
Scotland  are  ripe  for  such  an  agitation,  and,  once  fairly 
begun,  it  can  have  but  one  result — the  victory  of  the 
popular  cause. 


CHAPTER  XI. 

HOW  TO  WIN. 

Nor  is  it  merely  the  laboring  classes  of  Great  Britain 
who  may  thus  be  brought  into  the  fight,  if  the  true 
standard  be  raised.  To  demand  the  nationalization  of 
land  by  the  simple  means  I  have  proposed  makes  possi¬ 
ble — nay,  as  the  discussion  goes  on,  makes  inevitable — 
an  irresistible  combination,  the  combination  of  labor 
and  capital  against  landlordism.  This  combination 
proved  its  power  by  winning  the  battle  of  free  trade  in 
1846  against  the  most  determined  resistance  of  the 
landed  interest.  It  would  be  much  more  powerful  now, 
and,  if  it  can  again  be  made  on  the  land  question,  it  can 
again  force  the  intrenchments  of  the  landed  aristocracy. 

This  combination  can  not  be  made  on  any  of  the 
timid,  illogical  schemes  as  yet  proposed  ;  but  it  can  be 
made  on  the  broad  principle  that  land  is  rightfully  com¬ 
mon  property.  Paradoxical  as  it  may  seem,  it  is  yet 
true  that,  while  the  present  position  of  the  Irish  agita¬ 
tors  does  involve  a  menace  to  capital,  the  absolute  denial 
of  the  right  of  private  property  in  land  would  ?iot. 

In  admitting  that  the  landlords  ought  to  get  any  rent 


52 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


at  all,  in  admitting  that,  if  the  land  is  taken  from  them, 
they  must  be  paid  for  it,  the  Irish  agitators  give  away 
their  whole  case.  For  in  this  they  admit  that  the  land 
really  belongs  to  the  landlords,  and  put  property  in  land 
in  the  same  category  with  other  property.  Thus  they 
place  themselves  in  an  indefensible  position  ;  thus  they 
give  to  the  agitation  a  “communistic”  *  character,  and 
excite  against  it  that  natural  and  proper  feeling  which 
strongly  resents  any  attack  upon  the  rights  of  property 
as  an  attack  upon  the  very  foundations  of  society.  It 
was  doubtless  this  mistake  of  the  agitators  in  admitting 
the  right  of  private  property  in  land  to  which  Archbishop 
McCabe  recently  alluded  in  saying  that  some  of  the  ut¬ 
terances  of  the  agitators  excited  the  solicitude  of  the 
Iloly  See.  For  this  mistake  gives  to  the  agitation  the 
character  of  an  attack  upon  the  rights  of  property.  If 
the  land  is  really  the  property  of  the  landlords  (and  this 
is  admitted  when  it  is  admitted  that  they  are  entitled 
to  any  rent  or  to  any  compensation),  then  to  limit  the 
rent  which  they  shall  get,  or  to  interfere  with  their  free¬ 
dom  to  make  what  terms  they  please  with  tenants,  is  an 
attack  upon  property  rights.  If  the  land  is  rightfully 
the  landlords’,  then  is  any  compulsion  as  to  how  they 
shall  let  it,  or  on  what  terms  they  shall  part  with  it,  a 
bad  and  dangerous  precedent,  which  naturally  alarms 
capital  and  excites  the  solicitude  of  those  who  are  con¬ 
cerned  for  good  morals  and  social  order.  For,  if  a  man 
may  be  made  to  part  with  one  species  of  property  by 
Boycotting  or  agitation,  why  not  with  another  ?  If  a 
man’s  title  to  land  is  as  rightful  as  his  title  to  his 
watch,  what  is  the  difference  between  agitation  by  Land 
League  meetings  and  Parliamentary  filibustering  to 
make  him  give  up  the  one  and  agitation  with  a  cocked 
pistol  to  make  him  give  up  the  other? 

But,  if  it  be  denied  that  land  justly  is,  or  can  be,  pri¬ 
vate  property,  if  the  equal  rights  of  the  whole  people  to 
the  use  of  the  elements  gratuitously  furnished  by  Na¬ 
ture  be  asserted  without  drawback  or  compromise,  then 
the  essential  difference  between  property  in  land  and 


*  I  use  the  word  in  the  usual  sense  in  which  it  is  used  by  the  vulgar, 
and  in  which  a  communist  is  understood  as  one  who  wants  to  divide  up 
other  people’s  property. 


HOW  TO  WIN. 


53 


property  in  things  of  human  production  is  at  once 
brought  out.  Then  will  it  clearly  appear  not  only  that 
the  denial  of  the  right  of  individual  property  in  land 
does  not  involve  any  menace  to  legitimate  property 
rights,  but  that  the  maintenance  of  private  property  in 
land  necessarily  involves  a  denial  of  the  right  to  all  other 
property,  and  that  the  recognition  of  the  claims  of  the 
landlords  means  a  continuous  robbery  of  capital  as  well 
as  of  labor. 

All  this  will  appear  more  and  more  clearly  as  the  prac¬ 
tical  measures  necessary  to  make  land  common  property 
are  proposed  and  discussed.  These  simple  measures 
involve  no  harsh  proceedings,  no  forcible  dispossession, 
no  shock  to  public  confidence,  no  retrogression  to  a 
lower  industrial  organization,  no  loaning  of  public 
money,  or  establishment  of  cumbrous  commissions. 
Instead  of  doing  violence  to  the  rightful  sense  of  prop¬ 
erty,  they  assert  and  vindicate  it.  The  way  to  make 
land  common  property  is  simply  to  take  rent  for  the 
common  benefit.  And  to  do  this,  the  easy  way  is  to 
abolish  one  tax  after  another,  until  the  whole  weight  of 
taxation  falls  upon  the  value  of  land.  When  that  point 
is  reached,  the  battle  is  won.  The  hare  is  caught,  killed, 
and  skinned,  and  to  cook  him  will  be  a  very  easy  mat¬ 
ter.  The  real  fight  will  come  on  the  proposition  to  con¬ 
solidate  existing  taxation  upon  land  values.  When 
that  is  once  won,  the  landholders  will  not  merely  have 
been  decisively  defeated,  they  will  have  been  routed  ; 
and  the  nature  of  land  values  will  be  so  generally  un¬ 
derstood  that  to  raise  taxation  so  as  to  take  the  whole 
rent  for  common  purposes  will  be  a  mere  matter  of 
course. 

The  political  art  is  like  the  military  art.  It  consists 
in  combining  the  greatest  strength  against  the  point  of 
least  resistance.  I  have  pointed  out  the  way  in  which, 
in  the  case  we  are  considering,  this  can  be  done.  And, 
the  more  the  matter  is  considered,  the  clearer  and 
clearer  will  it  appear  that  there  is  every  practical  rea¬ 
son,  as  there  is  every  theoretical  reason,  why  the  Irish 
reformers  should  take  this  vantage-ground  of  principle. 
To  propose  to  put  the  public  burdens  upon  the  land¬ 
holders  is  not  a  novel  and  unheard  of  thing  against 
which  English  prejudice  would  run  as  something  “  new 


54 


THE  LAND  QUEST  I  OH. 


fangled,”  some  new  invention  of  modern  socialism.  On 
the  contrary,  it  is  the  ancient  English  practice  It 
would  be  but  a  return,  in  a  form  adapted  to  modern 
times,  to  the  system  under  which  English  land  was  orig¬ 
inally  parcelled  out  to  the  predecessors  of  the  present 
holders — the  just  system,  recognized  for  centuries,  that 
those  who  enjoy  the  common  property  should  bear  the 
common  burdens.  The  putting  of  property  in  land  in 
the  same  category  as  property  in  things  produced  by 
labor  is  comparatively  modern.  In  England,  as  in 
Ireland  and  Scotland,  as  in  fact  among  every  people  of 
whom  we  know  anything,  the  land  was  originally  treated 
as  common  property,  and  this  recognition  ran  all 
through  the  feudal  system.  The  essence  of  the  feudal 
system  was  in  treating  the  landholders  not  as  an  owner, 
but  as  a  lessee.  William  the  Conqueror  did  not  give  away 
the  land  of  England  as  the  Church  lands  were  given 
away  by  Henry  VIII.,  when  he  divided  among  his  syco¬ 
phants  the  property  of  the  people,  which,  after  the  man¬ 
ner  of  the  times,  had  been  set  apart  for  the  support  of 
religious,  educational,  and  charitable  institutions.  To 
every  grant  of  land  made  by  the  Conqueror  was  an¬ 
nexed  a  condition  which  amounted  to  a  heavy  perpet¬ 
ual  tax  or  rent.  One  of  his  first  acts  was  to  divide  the 
soil  of  England  into  sixty  thousand  knights’  fees  ;  and 
thus,  besides  many  other  dues  and  obligations,  was 
thrown  upon  the  landholders  the  cost  of  providing  and 
maintaining  the  army.  All  the  long,  costly  wars  that 
England  fought  during  feudal  times  involved  no  public 
debt.  Public  debt,  pauperism,  and  the  grinding  pov¬ 
erty  of  the  poorer  classes  came  in  as  the  landholders 
gradually  shook  off  the  obligations  on  which  they  had 
received  their  land,  an  operation  culminating  in  the  ab¬ 
olition  after  the  Restoration  of  the  feudal  tenures,  for 
which  were  substituted  indirect  taxes  that  still  weigh 
upon  the  whole  people.  To  now  reverse  this  process, 
to  abolish  the  taxes  which  are  born  by  labor  and  capi¬ 
tal,  and  to  substitute  for  them  a  tax  on  rent,  would  not 
be  the  adoption  of  anything  new,  but  a  simple  going 
back  to  the  old  plan.  In  England,  as  in  Ireland,  the 
movement  would  appeal  to  the  popular  imagination  as 
a  demand  for  the  reassertion  of  ancient  rights. 

There  are  other  most  important  respects  in  which  this 


HOW  TO  WIN : 


55 


measure  will  commend  itself  to  the  English  mind.  The 
tax  upon  land  values  or  rent  is  in  all  economic  respects 
the  most  perfect  of  taxes.  No  political  economist  will 
deny  that  it  combines  the  maximum  of  certainty  with 
the  minimum  of  loss  and  cost  ;  that,  unlike  taxes  upon 
capital  or  exchange  or  improvement,  it  does  not  check 
production  or  enhance  prices  or  fall  ultimately  upon 
the  consumer^  And,  in  proposing  to  abolish  all  other 
taxes  in  favor  of  this  theoretically  perfect  tax,  the  Land 
Reformers  will  have  on  their  side  the  advantage  of 
ideas  already  current,  while  they  can  bring  the  argu- 
menturn  ad  hominem  to  bear  on  those  who  might  never 
comprehend  an  abstract  principle.  Englishmen  of  all 
classes  have  happily  been  educated  up  to  a  belief  in 
free  trade,  though  a  very  large  amount  of  revenue  is 
still  collected  from  customs.  Let  the  Land  Reformers 
take  advantage  of  this  by  proposing  to  carry  out  the 
doctrine  of  free  trade  to  its  fullest  extent.  If  a  revenue 
tariff  is  better  than  a  protective  tariff,  then  no  tariff  at 
all  is  better  than  a  revenue  tariff.  Let  them  propose  to 
abolish  the  customs  duties  entirely,  and  to  abolish  as  well 
harbor  dues  and  lighthouse  dues  and  dock  charges,  and 
in  their  place  to  add  to  the  tax  on  rent,  or  the  value  of 
land  exclusive  of  improvements.  Let  them  in  the  same 
way  propose  to  get  rid  of  the  excise,  the  various  license 
taxes,  the  tax  upon  buildings,  the  onerous  and  unpopu¬ 
lar  income  tax,  etc.,  and  to  saddle  all  public  expenses 
on  the  landlords. 

This  would  bring  home  the  land  question  to  thou¬ 
sands  and  thousands  who  have  never  thought  of  it  be¬ 
fore  ;  to  thousands  and  thousands  who  have  heretofore 
looked  upon  the  land  question  as  something  peculiarly 
Irish,  or  something  that  related  exclusively  to  agricul¬ 
ture  and  to  farmers,  and  have  never  seen  how,  in  various 
direct  and  indirect  ways,  they  have  to  contribute  to  the 
immense  sums  received  by  the  landlords  as  rent.  It 
would  be  putting  the  argument  in  a  shape  in  which 
even  the  most  stupid  could  understand  it.  (  It  would  be 
directing  the  appeal  to  a  spot  where  even  the  unimagi¬ 
native  are  sensitive — the  pocket.  How  long  would  a 
merchant  or  banker  or  manufacturer  or  annuitant  re 
gard  as  dangerous  and  wicked  an.  agitation  which  pro 
posed  to  take  taxation  off  of  him  ?]  Even  the  most  prep 


56 


THE  LA, YD  QUESTION, \ 


udiced  can  be  relied  on  to  listen  with  patience  to  an 
argument  in  favor  of  making  some  one  else  pay  what 
they  now  are  paying. 

Let  me  illustrate  by  a  little  story  what  I  feel  confident 
would  be  the  effect  of  the  policy  I  propose  : 

Once  upon  a  time  I  was  the  Pacific-coast  agent  of  an 
Eastern  news  association,  which  took  advantage  of  an 
opposition  telegraph  company  to  run  against  the  Asso¬ 
ciated  Press  monopoly.  The  association  in  California 
consisted  of  one  strong  San  Francisco  paper,  to  which 
telegraphic  news  was  of  much  importance,  and  a  num¬ 
ber  of  interior  papers,  to  which  it  was  of  minor  impor¬ 
tance,  if  of  any  importance  at  all.  It  became  necessary 
to  raise  more  money  for  the  expenses  of  collecting  and 
transmitting  these  dispatches,  and,  thinking  it  only  fair, 
I  assessed  the  increased  cost  to  the  strong  metropolitan 
paper.  The  proprietor  of  this  paper  was  very  indignant. 
He  appealed  to  the  proprietors  of  all  the  other  papers, 
and  they  all  joined  in  his  protest.  I  replied  by  calling 
a  meeting.  At  this  meeting  the  proprietor  of  the  San 
Francisco  paper  led  off  with  an  indignant  speech.  lie 
was  seconded  by  several  others,  and  evidently  had  the 
sympathy  of  the  whole  crowd.  Then  came  my  turn.  I 
said,  in  effect  :  “  Gentlemen,  you  can  do  what  you  please 
about  this  matter.  Whatever  satisfies  you  satisfies  me. 
The  only  thing  fixed  is,  that  more  money  has  to  be 
raised.  As  this  San  Francisco  paper  pays  now  a  much 
lower  relative  rate  than  you  do,  I  thought  it  only  fair 
that  it  should  pay  the  increased  cost.  But,  if  you  think 
otherwise,  there  is  no  reason  in  the  world  why  you 
should  not  pay  it  yourselves.”  The  debate  immediately 
took  another  turn,  and  in  a  few  minutes  my  action  was 
endorsed  by  a  unanimous  vote,  for  the  San  Francisco 
man  was  so  disgusted  by  the  way  his  supporters  left  him 
that  he  would  not  vote  at  all. 

Now,  that  is  just  about  what  will  happen  to  the  British 
landlords  if  the  question  be  put  in  the  way  I  propose. 
The  British  landowners  are  in  numbers  but  an  insignifi¬ 
cant  minority.  And,  the  more  they  protested  against 
the  injustice  of  having  to  pay  all  the  taxes,  the  quicker 
would  the  public  mind  realize  the  essential  injustice  of 
private  property  in  land,  the  quicker  would  the  majority 
uf  the  people  come  to  see  that  the  landowners  ought  not 


HOW  TO  WIN. 


57 


only  to  pay  all  the  taxes,  but  a  good  deal  more  besides. 
Once  put  the  question  in  such  a  way  that  the  British 
workingman  will  realize  that  he  pays  two  prices  for  his 
ale  and  half  a  dozen  prices  for  his  tobacco,  because  a 
landowners’  Parliament  in  the  time  of  Charles  II.  shook 
off  their  ancient  dues  to  the  State,  and  imposed  them  in 
indirect  taxation  on  him  ;  once  bring  to  the  attention  of 
the  well-to-do  Englishman,  who  grunts  as  he  pays  his  in¬ 
come  tax,  the  question  as  to  whether  the  landowner  who 
draws  his  income  from  property  that  of  natural  right  be¬ 
longs  to  the  whole  people  ought  not  to  pay  it  instead  of 
him,  and  it  will  not  be  long  before  the  absurd  injustice 
of  allowing  rent  to  be  appropriated  by  individuals  will 
be  thoroughly  understood.  This  is  a  very  different  thing 
from  asking  the  British  taxpayer  to  buy  out  the  Irish 
landlord  for  the  sake  of  the  Irish  peasant. 

I  have  been  speaking  as  though  all  landholders  would 
resist  the  change  which  would  sacrifice  their  special  inter¬ 
ests  to  the  larger  interests  of  society.  But  I  am  satisfied 
that  to  think  this  is  to  do  landholders  a  great  injustice. 
For  landholders  as  a  class  are  not  more  stupid  nor  more 
selfish  than  any  other  class.  And  as  they  saw,  as  they 
must  see,  as  the  discussion  progresses,  that  they  also 
would  be  the  gainers  in  the  great  social  change  which 
would  abolish  poverty  and  elevate  the  very  lowest  classes 
— the  “mudsills”  of  society,  as  a  Southern  Senator  ex¬ 
pressively  called  them  during  the  Slavery  discussion — 
above  the  want,  the  misery,  the  vice,  and  degradation  in 
which  they  are  now  plunged,  there  are  many  landowners 
who  would  join  heartily  and  unreservedly  in  the  effort 
to  bring  this  change  about.  This  I  believe,  not  merely 
because  my  reading  and  observation  both  teach  me  that 
low,  narrow  views  of  self-interest  are  not  the  strongest 
of  human  motives,  but  because  I  know  that  to-day  among 
those  who  see  the  truth  I  have  here  tried  to  set  forth,  and 
who  would  carry  out  the  reform  I  have  proposed,  are  many 
landholders.*  And,  if  they  be  earnest  men,  I  appeal  to 


*  Among  the  warm  friends  my  book  “  Progress  and  Poverty  ”  has  found 
are  many  landholders — some  of  them  large  landholders.  As  types  I  may 
mention  the  names  of  D.  A.  Learnard,  of  San  Joaquin,  a  considerable 
farmer,  who  had  no  sooner  read  it  than  he  sent  for  a  dozen  copies  to 
circulate  among  his  neighbors  ;  Hiram  Tubbs,  of  San  Francisco,  the 
pwner  of  much  valuable  real  estate  in  and  near  that  city  j  and  Sir  George 


5« 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


landholders  as  confidently  as  to  any  other  class.  There 
is  that  in  a  great  truth  that  can  raise  a  human  soul  above 
the  mists  of  selfishness. 

The  course  which  I  suggest  is  the  only  course  which 
can  be  logically  based  on  principle.  It  has  everything 
to  commend  it.  It  will  concentrate  the  greatest  strength 
against  the  least  resistance.  And  it  will  be  on  the  right 
line.  Every  step  gained  will  be  an  advance  toward  the 
ultimate  goal  ;  every  step  gained  will  make  easier  the 
next. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 

In  speaking  with  special  reference  to  the  case  of  Ire¬ 
land,  I  have,  so  far  as  general  principles  are  concerned, 
been  using  it  as  a  stalking-horse.  In  discussing  the  Irish 
land  question,  we  really  discuss  the  most  vital  of  Amer¬ 
ican  questions.  And  if  we  of  the  United  States  can  not 
see  the  beam  in  our  own  eye,  save  by  looking  at  the 
mote  in  our  brother’s,  then  let  us  look  at  the  mote  ;  and 
let  us  take  counsel  together  how  he  may  get  it  out.  For, 
at  least,  we  shall  in  this  way  learn  how  we  may  deal 
with  our  own  case  when  we  wake  up  to  the  conscious¬ 
ness  of  it. 

And  never  had  the  parable  of  the  mote  and  the  beam 
a  better  illustration  than  in  the  attitude  of  so  many 
Americans  toward  this  Irish  land  question.  We  de¬ 
nounce  the  Irish  land  system  !  We  express  our  sympa¬ 
thy  with  Ireland  !  We  tender  our  advice  by  congres¬ 
sional  and  legislative  resolution  to  our  British  brethren 
across  the  sea  !  Truly  our  indignation  is  cheap  and  our 
sympathy  is  cheap,  and  our  advice  is  very,  very  cheap  ! 
For  what  are  we  doing  ?  Extending  over  new  soil  the 
very  institution  that  to  them  descended  from  a  ruder 
and  a  darker  time.  With  what  conscience  can  we  lec¬ 
ture  them  ?  With  all  power  in  the  hands  of  the  people, 

Grey,  of  New  Zealand,  the  owner  of  a  good  deal  of  land  in  that  colony, 
of  which  he  was  formerly  governor,  as  well,  as  l  understand,  of  valuable 
estates  in  England, 


IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


59 


with  institutions  yet  plastic,  with  millions  of  virgin 
acres  yet  to  settle,  it  should  be  ours  to  do  more  than 
vent  denunciation,  and  express  sympathy,  and  give  ad¬ 
vice.  It  should  be  ours  to  show  the  way.  This  we  have 
not  done  ;  this  we  do  not  do.  Out  in  our  new  States 
may  be  seen  the  growth  of  a  system  of  cultivation  worse 
in  its  social  effects  than  that  which  prevails  in  Ireland. 
In  Ireland  the  laborer  has  some  sort  of  a  home,  and 
enjoys  some  of  the  family  affections.  In  these  great 
“  wheat-manufacturing  ”  districts  the  laborer  is  a  nomad, 
his  home  is  in  his  blankets,  which  he  carries  around 
with  him.  The  soil  bears  wheat,  crop  after  crop,  till  its 
fertility  is  gone.  It  does  not  bear  children.  These  ma¬ 
chine-worked  “grain  factories”  of  the  great  Republic 
of  the  New  World  are  doing  just  what  was  done  by  the 
slave-worked  latif undid  of  the  Roman  world.  Here  they 
prevent,  where  there  they  destroyed,  “the  crop  of 
men.  ”  And  in  our  large  cities  may  we  not  see  misery 
of  the  same  kind  as  exists  in  Ireland  ?  If  it  is  less  in 
amount,  is  it  not  merely  because  our  country  is  yet 
newer  ;  because  we  have  yet  a  wide  territory  and  a  sparse 
population — conditions  past  which  our  progress  is  rap¬ 
idly  carrying  us  ?  As  for  evictions,  is  it  an  unheard-of 
thing,  even  in  New  York,  for  families  to  be  turned  out 
of  their  homes  because  they  can  not  pay  the  rent  ?  Are 
there  not  many  acres  in  this  country  from  which  those 
who  made  homes  have  been  driven  by  sheriffs’  posses,  and 
even  by  troops?  Do  not  a  number  of  the  Mussell 
Slough  settlers  lie  in  Santa  Clara  jail  to-day  because  a 
great  railroad  corporation  set  its  envious  eyes  on  soil 
which  they  had  turned  from  desert  into  garden,  and  they 
in  their  madness  tried  to  resist  ejectment  ? 

And  the  men  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic  who 
vainly  imagine  that  they  may  settle  the  great  question 
now  pressing  upon  them  by  free  trade  in  land,  or  tenant- 
right,  or  some  mild  device  for  establishing  a  peasant 
proprietary — they  may  learn  something  about  their  own 
case  if  they  will  turn  their  eyes  to  us. 

We  have  had  free  trade  in  land  ;  we  have  had  in  our 
American  farmer,  owning  his  own  acres,  using  his  own 
capital,  and  working  with  his  own  hands,  something  far 
better  than  peasant  proprietorship.  We  have  had,  what 
no  legislation  can  give  the  people  of  Great  Britain,  vast 


6o 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


areas  of  virgin  soil.  We  have  had  all  of  these  undei 
democratic  institutions.  Yet  we  have  here  social  disease 
of  precisely  the  same  kind  as  that  which  exists  in  Ire¬ 
land  and  England.  And  the  reason  is  that  we  have  had 
here  precisely  the  same  cause — that  we  have  made  land 
private  property.  So  long  as  this  exists,  our  democratic 
institutions  are  vain,  our  pretence  of  equality  but  cruel 
irony,  our  public  schools  can  but  sow  the  seeds  of  dis¬ 
content.  So  long  as  this  exists,  material  progress  can 
but  force  the  masses  of  our  people  into  a  harder  and 
more  hopeless  slavery.  Until  we  in  some  way  make  the 
land,  what  Nature  intended  it  to  be,  common  property, 
until  we  in  some  way  secure  to  every  child  born  among 
us  his  natural  birthright,  we  have  not  established  the 
Republic  in  any  sense  worthy  of  the  name,  and  we  can 
not  establish  the  Republic.  Its  foundations  are  quick¬ 
sand. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

A  LITTLE  ISLAND  OR  A  LITTLE  WORLD. 

Imagine  an  island  girt  with  ocean  ;  imagine  a  little 
world  swimming  in  space.  Put  on  it,  in  imagination, 
human  beings.  Let  them  divide  the  land,  share  and 
share  alike,  as  individual  property.  At  first,  while  pop¬ 
ulation  is  sparse  and  industrial  processes  rude  and  prim¬ 
itive,  this  will  work  well  enough. 

Turn  away  the  eyes  of  the  mind  for  a  moment,  let 
time  pass,  and  look  again.  Some  families  will  have  died 
out,  some  have  greatly  multiplied  ;  on  the  whole,  copu¬ 
lation  will  have  largely  increased,  and  even  supposing 
there  have  been  no  important  inventions  or  improve¬ 
ments  in  the  productive  arts,  the  increase  in  population, 
by  causing  the  division  of  labor,  will  have  made  indus¬ 
try  more  complex.  During  this  time  some  of  these  peo¬ 
ple  will  have  been  careless,  generous,  improvident; 
some  will  have  been  thrifty  and  grasping.  Some  of 
them  will  have  devoted  much  of  their  powers  to  think¬ 
ing  of  how  they  themselves  and  the  things  they  see 
around  them  came  to  be,  to  inquiries  and  speculations 


A  LITTLE  ISLAND  OR  A  LITTLE  IVOR  ID. 


61 


as  to  what  there  is  in  the  universe  beyond  their  little  is¬ 
land  or  their  little  world,  to  making  poems,  painting  pic¬ 
tures,  or  writing  books  ;  to  noting  the  differences  in  rocks 
and  trees  and  shrubs  and  grasses  ;  to  classifying  beasts 
and  birds  and  fishes  and  insects — to  the  doing,  in  short, 
of  all  the  many  things  which  add  so  largely  to  the  sum 
of  human  knowledge  and  human  happiness,  without 
much  or  any  gain  of  wealth  to  the  doer.  Others  again 
will  have  devoted  all  their  energies  to  the  extending  of 
their  possessions.  What,  then,  shall  we  see,  land  hav¬ 
ing  been  all  this  time  treated  as  private  property  ? 
Clearly,  we  shall  see  that  the  primitive  equality  has 
given  way  to  inequality.  Some  will  have  very  much 
more  than  one  of  the  original  shares  into  which  the  land 
was  divided  ;  very  many  will  have  no  land  at  all.  Sup¬ 
pose  that,  in  all  things  save  this,  our  little  island  or  our 
little  world  is  Utopia — that  there  are  no  wars  or  rob¬ 
beries;  that  the  government  is  absolutely  pure  and  taxes 
nominal  ;  suppose,  if  you  want  to,  any  sort  of  a  cur¬ 
rency  ;  imagine,  if  you  can  imagine  such  a  world  or 
island,  that  interest  is  utterly  abolished  ;  yet  inequality 
in  the  ownership  of  land  will  have  produced  poverty  and 
virtual  slavery. 

For  the  people  we  have  supposed  are  human  beings 
— that  is  to  say,  in  their  physical  natures  at  least,  they 
are  animals  who  can  only  live  on  land  and  by  the  aid  of 
the  products  of  land.  They  may  make  machines  which 
will  enable  them  to  float  on  the  sea,  or  perhaps  to  fly  in 
the  air,  but  to  build  and  equip  these  machines  they  must 
have  land  and  the  products  of  land,  and  must  constantly 
come  back  to  land.  Therefore  those  who  own  the  land 
must  be  the  masters  of  the  rest.  Thus,  if  one  man  has 
come  to  own  all  the  land,  he  is  their  absolute  master 
even  to  life  or  death.  If  they  can  only  live  on  the  land 
on  his  terms,  then  they  can  only  live  on  his  terms,  for 
without  land  they  cannot  live.  They  are  his  absolute 
slaves,  and  so  long  as  his  ownership  is  acknowledged, 
if  they  want  to  live,  they  must  do  in  everything  as  he 
wills. 

If,  however,  the  concentration  of  landownership  has 
not  gone  so  far  as  to  make  one  or  a  very  few  men  the 
owners  of  all  the  land — if  there  are  still  so  many  land- 
owners  that  there  is  competition  between  them  as  well 


62 


THE  LA  HD  QUEST!  OH. 


as  between  those  who  have  only  their  labor — then  the 
terms  on  which  these  non-landholders  can  live  will  seem 
more  like  free  contract.  But  it  will  not  be  free  con¬ 
tract.  Land  can  yield  no  wealth  without  the  applica¬ 
tion  of  labor  ;  labor  can  produce  no  wealth  without 
land.  These  are  the  two  equally  necessary  factors  of 
production.  Yet,  to  say  that  they  are  equally  necessaiy 
factors  of  production  is  not  to  say  that,  in  the  making 
of  contracts  as  to  how  the  results  of  production  are  di¬ 
vided,  the  possessors  of  these  two  meet  on  equal  terms. 
For  the  nature  of  these  two  factors  is  very  different 
Land  is  a  natural  element  ;  the  human  being  must  have 
his  stomach  filled  every  few  hours.  Land  can  exist 
without  labor,  but  labor  can  not  exist  without  land. 
If  I  own  a  piece  of  land,  I  can  let  it  lay  idle  for  a  year 
or  for  years,  and  it  will  eat  nothing.  But  the  laborer 
must  eat  every  day,  and  his  family  must  eat.  And  so, 
in  the  making  of  terms  between  them,  the  landowner 
has  an  immense  advantage  over  the  laborer.  It  is  on 
the  side  of  the  laborer  that  the  intense  pressure  of  com¬ 
petition  comes,  for  in  his  case  it  is  competition  urged 
by  hunger.  And,  further  than  this  :  As  population  in¬ 
creases,  as  the  competition  for  the  use  of  land  becomes 
more  and  more  intense,  so  are  the  owners  of  land  en¬ 
abled  to  get  for  the  use  of  their  land  a  larger  and  larger 
part  of  the  wealth  which  labor  exerted  upon  it  pro¬ 
duces.  That  is  to  say,  the  value  of  land  steadily  rises. 
Now,  this  steady  rise  in  the  value  of  land  brings  about 
a  confident  expectation  of  future  increase  of  value, 
which  produces  among  landowners  all  the  effects  of  a 
combination  to  hold  for  higher  prices.  Thus  there  is  a 
constant  tendency  to  force  mere  laborers  to  take  less 
and  less  or  to  give  more  and  more  (put  it  which  way 
you  please,  it  amounts  to  the  same  thing)  of  the  pro¬ 
ducts  of  their  work  for  the  opportunity  to  work.  And 
thus,  in  the  very  nature  of  things,  we  should  see  on  our 
little  island  or  our  little  world  that,  after  a  time  had 
passed,  some  of  the  people  would  be  able  to  take  and 
enjoy  a  superabundance  of  all  the  fruits  of  labor  with¬ 
out  doing  any  labor  at  all,  while  others  would  be  forced 
to  work  the  livelong  day  for  a  pitiful  living. 

But  let  us  introduce  another  element  into  the  sup¬ 
position.  Let  us  suppose  great  discoveries  and  inven- 


THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS  POL  S/E  LE.  63 

tions — such  as  the  steam  engine,  the  power  loom,  the 
Bessemer  process,  the  reaping  machine,  and  the  thou- 
sand-and-cne  labor-saving  devices  that  are  such  a  marked 
feature  of  our  era.  What  would  be  the  result  ? 

Manifestly,  the  effect  of  all  such  discoveries  and  in¬ 
ventions  is  to  increase  the  power  of  labor  in  producing 
wealth — to  enable  the  same  amount  of  wealth  to  be 
produced  by  less  labor,  or  a  greater  amount  with  the 
same  labor.  But  none  of  them  lessen,  or  can  lessen  the 
necessity  for  land.  Until  we  can  discover  some  way  of 
making  something  out  of  nothing — and  that  is  so  far 
beyond  our  powers  as  to  be  absolutely  unthinkable — 
there  is  no  possible  discovery  or  invention  which  can 
lessen  the  dependence  of  labor  upon  land.  And,  this 
being  the  case,  the  effect  of  these  labor-saving  devices, 
land  being  the  private  property  of  some,  would  simply 
be  to  increase  the  proportion  of  the  wealth  produced 
that  landowners  could  demand  for  the  use  of  their  land. 
The  ultimate  effect  of  these  discoveries  and  inventions 
would  be  not  to  benefit  the  laborer,  but  to  make  him 
more  dependent. 

And,  since  we  are  imagining  conditions,  imagine  la¬ 
bor-saving  inventions  to  go  to  the  farthest  imaginable 
point,  that  is  to  say,  to  perfection.  What  then  ?  Why 
then,  the  necessity  for  labor  being  done  away  with,  all 
the  wealth  that  the  land  could  produce  would  go  entire 
to  the  landowners.  None  of  it  whatever  could  he 
claimed  by  any  one  else.  For  the  laborers  there  would 
be  no  use  at  all.  If  they  continued  to  exist,  it  would 
be  merely  as  paupers  on  the  bounty  of  the  landowners  ! 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS  POSSIBLE. 

In  the  effects  upon  the  distribution  of  wealth,  of  mak¬ 
ing  land  private  property,  we  may  thus  see  an  explana¬ 
tion  of  that  paradox  presented  by  modern  progress. 
The  perplexing  phenomena  of  deepening  want  with  in¬ 
creasing  wealth,  of  labor  rendered  more  dependent  and 
helpless  by  the  very  introduction  of  labor-saving  ma- 


64 


THE  LA  HD  QUEST  I  OH. 


chinery,  are  the  inevitable  result  of  natural  laws  as  fixed 
and  certain  as  the  law  of  gravitation.  Private  property 
in  land  is  the  primary  cause  of  the  monstrous  inequali¬ 
ties  which  are  developing  in  modern  society.  It  is  this, 
and  not  any  miscalculation  of  Nature  in  bringing  into 
the  world  more  mouths  than  she  can  feed,  that  gives  rise 
to  that  tendency  of  wages  to  a  minimum — that  “  iron  law 
of  wages,”  as  the  Germans  call  it — that,  in  spite  of  all 
advances  in  productive  power,  compels  the  laboring 
classes  to  the  least  return  on  which  they  will  consent  to 
live.  It  is  this  that  produces  all  those  phenomena  that 
are  so  often  attributed  to  the  conflict  of  labor  and  capi¬ 
tal.  It  is  this  that  condemns  Irish  peasants  to  rags  and 
hunger,  that  produces  the  pauperism  of  England  and 
the  tramps  of  America.  It  is  this  that  makes  the  alms¬ 
house  and  the  penitentiary  the  marks  of  what  we  call 
high  civilization ;  that  in  the  midst  of  schools  and 
churches  degrades  and  brutalizes  men,  crushes  the  sweet¬ 
ness  out  of  womanhood  and  the  joy  out  of  childhood. 
It  is  this  that  makes  lives  that  might  be  a  blessing  a  pain 
and  a  curse,  and  every  year  drives  more  and  more  to 
seek  unbidden  refuge  in  the  gates  of  death.  For,  a  per¬ 
manent  tendency  to  inequality  once  set  up,  all  the  forces 
of  progress  tend  to  greater  and  greater  inequality. 

All  this  is  contrary  to  Nature.  The  poverty  and  mis¬ 
ery,  the  vice  and  degradation,  that  spring  from  the  un¬ 
equal  distribution  of  wealth,  are  not  the  results  of  natural 
law  ;  they  spring  from  our  defiance  of  natural  law.  They 
are  the  fruits  of  our  refusal  to  obey  the  supreme  law  of 
justice.  It  is  because  we  rob  the  child  of  his  birthright ; 
because  we  make  the  bounty  which  the  Creator  intended 
for  all  the  exclusive  property  of  some,  that  these  things 
come  upon  us,  and,  though  advancing  and  advancing, 
we  chase  but  the  mirage. 

When,  lit  by  lightning-flash  or  friction  amid  dry 
grasses,  the  consuming  flames  of  fire  first  flung  their 
lurid  glow  into  the  face  of  man,  how  must  he  have  started 
back  in  affright !  When  he  first  stood  by  the  shores  of 
the  sea,  how  must  its  waves  have  said  to  him,  “Thus  far 
shalt  thou  go,  but  no  farther”  !  Yet,  as  he  learned  to 
use  them,  fire  became  his  most  useful  servant,  the  sea 
his  easiest  highway.  The  most  destructive  element  of 
which  we  know — that  which  for  ages  and  ages  seemed 


THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS  POSSIBLE.  65 


the  very  thunderbolt  of  the  angry  gods — is,  as  we  are 
now  beginning  to  learn,  fraught  for  us  with  untold 
powers  of  usefulness.  Already  it  enables  us  to  annihi¬ 
late  space  in  our  messages,  to  illuminate  the  night  with 
new  suns  ;  and  its  uses  are  only  beginning.  And 
throughout  all  Nature,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  whatever  is 
potent  for  evil  is  potent  for  good.  “  Dirt,”  said  Lord 
Brougham,  “  is  matter  in  the  wrong  place.”  And  so  the 
squalor  and  vice  and  misery  that  abound  in  the  very 
heart  of  our  civilization  are  but  results  of  the  misappli¬ 
cation  of  forces  in  their  nature  most  elevating. 

I  doubt  not  that  whichever  way  a  man  may  turn  to  in¬ 
quire  of  Nature,  he  will  come  upon  adjustments  which 
will  arouse  not  merely  his  wonder,  but  his  gratitude. 
Yet  what  has  most  impressed  me  with  the  feeling  that 
the  laws  of  Nature  are  the  laws  of  beneficent  intelli¬ 
gence  is  what  I  see  of  the  social  possibilities  involved  in 
the  law  of  rent.  Rent*  springs  from  natural  causes. 
It  arises,  as  society  develops,  from  the  differences  in 
natural  opportunities  and  the  differences  in  the  distribu¬ 
tion  of  population.  It  increases  with  the  division  of 
labor,  with  the  advance  of  the  arts,  with  the  progress  of 
invention.  And  thus,  by  virtue  of  a  law  impressed  upon 
the  very  nature  of  things,  has  the  Creator  provided  that 
the  natural  advance  of  mankind  shall  be  an  advance 
toward  equality,  an  advance  toward  co-operation,  an  ad¬ 
vance  toward  a  social  state  in  which  not  even  the  weak¬ 
est  need  be  crowded  to  the  wall,  in  which  even  for  the 
unfortunate  and  the  cripple  there  may  be  ample  pro¬ 
vision.  For  this  revenue,  which  arises  from  the  common 
property,  which  represents  not  the  creation  of  value  by 
the  individual,  but  the  creation  by  the  community  as  a 
whole,  which  increases  just  as  society  develops,  affords 
a  common  fund,  which,  properly  used,  tends  constantly 
to  equalize  conditions,  to  open  the  largest  opportunities 
for  all,  and  to  utterly  banish  want  or  the  fear  of  want. 

The  squalid  poverty  that  festers  in  the  heart  of  our 
civilization,  the  vice  and  crime  and  degradation  and  rav¬ 
ening  greed  that  flow  from  it,  are  the  results  of  a  treat¬ 
ment  of  land  that  ignores  the  simple  law  of  justice,  a  law 


*  I,  of  course,  use  the  word  “rent”  in  its  economic,  not  in  its  com¬ 
mon  sense,  meaning  by  it  what  is  commonly  called  ground  rent. 

5 


06 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


so  clear  and  plain  that  it  is  universally  recognized  by 
the  veriest  savages.  What  is  by  nature  the  common 
birthright  of  all,  we  have  made  the  exclusive  property 
of  individuals  ;  what  is  by  natural  law  the  common  fund, 
from  which  common  wants  should  be  met,  we  give  to  a 
few  that  they  may  lord  it  over  their  fellows.  And  so 
some  are  gorged  while  some  go  hungry,  and  more  is 
wasted  than  would  suffice  to  keep  all  in  luxury. 

In  this  nineteenth  century,  among  any  people  who 
have  begun  to  utilize  the  forces  and  methods  of  modern 
production,  there  is  no  necessity  for  want.  There  is  no 
good  reason  why  even  the  poorest  should  not  have  all 
the  comforts,  all  the  luxuries,  all  the  opportunities  for 
culture,  all  the  gratifications  of  refined  taste  that  only 
the  richest  now  enjoy.  There  is  no  reason  why  anyone 
should  be  compelled  to  long  and  monotonous  labor. 
Did  invention  and  discovery  stop  to-day,  the  forces  of 
production  are  ample  for  this.  What  hampers  produc¬ 
tion  is  the  unnatural  inequality  in  distribution.  And, 
with  just  distribution,  invention  and  discovery  would 
only  have  begun. 

Appropriate  rent  in  the  way  I  propose,  and  speculative 
rent  would  be  at  once  destroyed.  The  dogs  in  the  man¬ 
ger  who  are  now  holding  so  much  land  they  have  no 
use  for,  in  order  to  extract  a  high  price  from  those  who 
do  want  to  use  it,  would  be  at  once  choked  off,  and  land 
from  which  labor  and  capital  are  now  debarred  under 
penalty  of  a  heavy  fine  would  be  thrown  open  to  im¬ 
provement  and  use.  The  incentive  to  land  monopoly 
would  be  gone.  Population  would  spread  where  it  is 
now  too  dense,  and  become  denser  where  it  is  now  too 
sparse. 

Appropriate  rent  in  this  way,  and  not  only  would  nat¬ 
ural  opportunities  be  thus  opened  to  labor  and  capital, 
but  all  the  taxes  which  now  weigh  upon  production  and 
rest  upon  the  consumer  could  be  abolished.  The 
demand  for  labor  would  increase,  wages  would  rise, 
every  wheel  of  production  would  be  set  in  motion. 

Appropriate  rent  in  this  way,  and  the  present  expenses 
of  government  would  be  at  once  very  much  reduced — 
reduced  directly  by  the  saving  in  the  present  cumbrous 
and  expensive  schemes  of  taxation,  reduced  indirectly 
by  the  diminution  in  pauperism  and  in  crime.  This 


THE  CIVILIZATION-  THAT  IS  POSSIBLE.  67 


simplification  in  governmental  machinery,  this  elevation 
of  moral  tone  which  would  result,  would  make  it  possi¬ 
ble  for  government  to  assume  the  running  of  railroads, 
telegraphs,  and  other  businesses  which,  being  in  their 
nature  monopolies,  can  not,  as  experience  is  showing, 
be  safely  left  in  the  hands  of  private  individuals  and 
corporations.  In  short,  losing  its  character  as  a  re¬ 
pressive  agency,  government  could  thus  gradually  pass 
into  an  administrative  agency  of  the  great  co-operative 
association — society. 

For,  appropriate  rent  in  this  way,  and  there  would  be 
at  once  a  large  surplus  over  and  above  what  are  now 
considered  the  legitimate  expenses  of  government.  We 
could  divide  this,  if  we  wanted  to,  among  the  whole 
community,  share  and  share  alike.  Or  we  could  give 
every  boy  a  small  capital  for  a  start  when  he  came  of 
age,  every  girl  a  dower,  every  widow  an  annuity,  every 
aged  person  a  pension,  out  of  this  common  estate.  Or 
we  could  do  with  our  great  common  fund  many,  many 
things  that  would  be  for  the  common  benefit,  many, 
many  things  that  would  give  to  the  poorest  what  even 
the  richest  can  not  now  enjoy.  We  could  establish  free 
libraries,  lectures,  museums,  art-galleries,  observatories, 
gymnasiums,  baths,  parks,  theatres  ;  we  could  line  our 
roads  with  fruit-trees,  and  make  our  cities  clean  and 
wholesome  and  beautiful  ;  we  could  conduct  experi¬ 
ments,  and  offer  rewards  for  inventions,  and  throw  them 
open  to  public  use.* 

Think  of  the  enormous  wastes  that  now  go  on  :  The 
waste  of  false  revenue  systems,  which  hamper  produc¬ 
tion  and  bar  exchange,  which  fine  a  man  for  erecting  a 
building  where  none  stood  before,  or  for  making  two 
blades  of  grass  grow  where  there  was  but  one.  The 
waste  of  unemployed  labor,  of  idle  machinery,  of  those 
periodical  depressions  of  industry  almost  as  destructive 
as  war.  The  waste  entailed  by  poverty,  and  the  vice  and 
crime  and  thriftlessness  and  drunkenness  that  spring 
from  it  ;  the  waste  entailed  by  that  greed  of  gain  that  is 
its  shadow,  and  which  makes  business  in  large  part  but  a 
masked  war  ;  the  waste  entailed  by  the  fret  and  worry 


*  A  million  dollars  spent  in  premiums  and  experiments  would,  in  all 
probability,  make  aerial  navigation  an  accomplished  fact. 


68 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


about  the  mere  physical  necessities  of  existence,  to 
which  so  many  of  us  are  condemned  ;  the  waste  entailed 
by  ignorance,  by  cramped  and  undeveloped  faculties,  by 
the  turning  of  human  beings  into  mere  machines  ! 

Think  of  these  enormous  wastes,  and  of  the  others 
which,  like  these,  are  due  to  the  fundamental  wrong 
which  produces  an  unjust  distribution  of  wealth  and 
distorts  the  natural  development  of  society,  and  you  will 
begin  to  see  what  a  higher,  purer,  richer  civilization  would 
be  made  possible  by  the  simple  measure  that  will  assert 
natural  rights.  You  will  begin  to  see  how,  even  if  no 
one  but  the  present  landholders  were  to  be  considered, 
this  would  be  the  greatest  boon  that  could  be  vouch¬ 
safed  them  by  society,  and  that,  for  them  to  fight  it, 
would  be  as  if  the  dog  with  a  tin  kettle  tied  to  his  tail 
should  snap  at  the  hand  that  offered  to  free  him.  Even 
the  greatest  landholder  !  As  for  such  landholders  as  our 
working  farmers  and  homestead  owners,  the  slightest 
discussion  would  show  them  that  they  had  everything 
to  gain  by  the  change.  But  even  such  landholders 
as  the  Duke  of  Westminster  and  the  Astors  would  be 
gainers. 

For  it  is  of  the  very  nature  of  injustice  that  it  really 
profits  no  one.  When  and  where  was  slavery  good  for 
slaveholders  ?  Did  her  cruelties  in  America,  her  expul¬ 
sions  of  Moors  and  Jews,  her  burnings  of  heretics,  profit 
Spain  ?  Has  England  gained  by  her  injustice  toward 
Ireland?  Did  not  the  curse  of  an  unjust  social  system 
rest  on  Louis  XIV.  and  Louis  XV.  as  weil  as  on  the  poor¬ 
est  peasant  whom  it  condemned  to  rags  and  starvation 
— as  well  as  on  that  Louis  whom  it  sent  to  the  block  ? 
Is  the  Czar  of  Russia  to  be  envied  ? 

This  we  may  know  certainly,  this  we  may  hold  to  con¬ 
fidently  :  that  which  is  unjust  can  really  profit  no  one  ; 
that  which  is  just  can  really  harm  no  one.  Though  all 
other  lights  move  and  circle,  this  is  the  pole-star  by 
which  we  may  safely  steer. 


THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS, \ 


6 Q 


CHAPTER  XV. 

THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS. 

When  we  think  of  the  civilization  that  might  be,  how 
poor  and  pitiful,  how  little  better  than  utter  barbarism, 
seems  this  civilization  of  which  we  boast !  Even  here, 
where  it  has  had  the  freest  field  and  fullest  development ! 
Even  here ! 

This  is  a  broad  land  and  a  rich  land.  How  wide  it  is, 
how  rich  it  is,  how  the  fifty  millions  of  us  already  here 
are  but  beginning  to  scratch  it,  a  man  can  not  begin  to 
realize,  till  he  does  some  thousands  of  miles  of  travel¬ 
ling  over  it.  There  are  a  school  and  a  church  and  a  news¬ 
paper  in  every  hamlet ;  we  have  no  privileged  orders, 
no  legacies  of  antiquated  institutions,  no  strong  and 
covertly  hostile  neighbors,  wTho  in  fancy  or  reality  oblige 
us  to  keep  up  great  standing  armies.  We  have  had  the 
experience  of  all  other  nations  to  guide  us  in  selecting 
what  is  good  and  rejecting  what  is  bad.  In  politics,  in 
religion,  in  science,  in  mechanism,  everything  shows 
the  latest  improvements.  We  think  we  stand,  and  in 
fact  we  do  stand,  in  the  very  van  of  civilization.  Food 
here  is  cheaper,  wTages  higher,  than  anywhere  else. 
There  is  here  a  higher  average  of  education,  of  intel¬ 
ligence,  of  material  comfort,  and  of  individual  opportu¬ 
nity,  than  among  any  other  of  the  great  civilized  na¬ 
tions.  Here  modern  civilization  is  at  its  very  best.  Yet 
even  here  ! 

Last  winter  I  was  in  San  Francisco.  There  are  in  San 
Francisco  citizens  who  can  build  themselves  houses  that 
cost  a  million  and  a  half ;  citizens  who  can  give  each  of 
their  children  two  millions  of  registered  United  States 
bonds  for  a  Christmas  present  ;  citizens  who  can  send 
their  wives  to  Paris  to  keep  house  there,  or  rather  to 
“keep  palace”  in  a  style  that  outdoes  the  lavishness  of 
Russian  grand  dukes ;  citizens  whose  daughters  are 
golden  prizes  to  the  bluest-blooded  of  English  aristo¬ 
crats  ;  citizens  wTho  can  buy  seats  in  the  United  States 
Senate  and  leave  them  empty,  just  to  show  their  gran 


70 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


deur.  There  are,  also,  in  San  Francisco  other  citizens 
Last  winter  I  could  hardly  walk  a  block  without  meet¬ 
ing  a  citizen  begging  for  ten  cents.  And,  when  a  charity 
fund  was  raised  to  give  work,  with  pick  and  shovel  to 
such  as  would  rather  work  than  beg,  the  applications 
were  so  numerous  that,  to  make  the  charity  fund  go  as  far 
as  possible,  one  set  of  men  was  discharged  after  having 
been  given  a  few  days’  work,  in  order  to  make  room  for 
another  set.  This  and  much  else  of  the  same  sort  I  saw 
in  San  Francisco  last  winter.  Likewise  in  Sacramento, 
and  in  other  towns. 

Last  summer,  on  the  plains,  I  took  from  its  tired 
mother,  and  held  in  my  arms,  a  little  sun-browned  baby, 
the  youngest  of  a  family  of  the  sturdy  and  keen  Western 
New  England  stock,  who  alone  in  their  two  wagons  had 
travelled  near  three  thousand  miles  looking  for  some 
place  to  locate  and  finding  none,  and  who  were  now  re¬ 
turning  to  where  the  father  and  his  biggest  boy  could 
go  to  work  on  a  railroad,  what  they  had  got  by  the  sale 
of  their  Nebraska  farm  all  gone.  And  I  walked  awhile 
by  the  side  of  long,  lank  Southwestern  men  who,  after 
similar  fruitless  journeyings  way  up  into  Washington 
Territory,  were  going  back  to  the  Choctaw  Nation. 

This  winter  I  have  been  in  New  York.  New  York  is 
the  greatest  and  richest  of  American  cities — the  third 
city  of  the  modern  world,  and  moving  steadily  toward 
the  first  place.  This  is  a  time  of  great  prosperity.  Never 
before  were  so  many  goods  sold,  so  much  business  done. 
Real  estate  is  advancing  with  big  jumps,  and  within  the 
last  few  months  many  fortunes  have  been  made  in  buy¬ 
ing  and  selling  vacant  lots.  Landlords  nearly  everywhere 
are  demanding  increased  rents  ;  asking  in  some  of  the 
business  quarters  an  increase  of  three  hundred  per  cent. 
Money  is  so  plenty  that  Government  four  per  cents 
sell  for  1 14,  and  a  bill  is  passing  Congress  for  refunding 
the  maturing  national  debt  at  three  per  cent,  per  annum, 
a  rate  that  awhile  ago  in  California  was  not  thought  ex¬ 
orbitant  per  month.  All  sorts  of  shares  and  bonds  have 
been  going  up  and  up.  You  can  sell  almost  anything  if 
you  give  it  a  high-sounding  corporate  name  and  issue 
well-printed  shares  of  stock.  Seats  in  the  Board  of 
Brokers  are  worth  thirty  thousand  dollars,  and  are  cheap 
at  that-  There  are  citizens  here  who  rake  in  millions  at 


THE  CIVILIZATION’  THAT  IS. 


T 

a  single  operation  with  as  much  ease  as  a  faro-dealer 
rakes  in  a  handful  of  chips. 

Nor  is  this  the  mere  seeming  prosperity  of  feverish 
speculation.  The  country  is  really  prosperous.  The 
crops  have  been  enormous,  the  demand  insatiable.  We 
have  at  last  a  sound  currency  ;  gold  has  been  pouring  in. 
The  railroads  have  been  choked  with  produce,  steel  rails 
are  being  laid  faster  than  ever  before  ;  all  sorts  of  fac¬ 
tories  are  running  full  time  or  over  time.  So  prosper¬ 
ous  is  the  country,  so  good  are  the  times,  that,  at  the 
Presidential  election  a  few  months  since,  the  determin¬ 
ing  argument  was  that  we  could  not  afford  to  take  the 
chance  of  disturbing  so  much  material  prosperity  by  a 
political  change. 

Nevertheless,  prosperous  as  are  these  times,  citizens 
of  the  United  States  beg  you  on  the  streets  for  ten  cents 
and  five  cents,  and  although  you  know  that  there  are  in 
this  city  two  hundred  charitable  societies,  although  you 
realize  that  on  general  principles  to  give  money  in  this 
way  is  to  do  evil  rather  than  good,  you  are  afraid  to  re¬ 
fuse  them  when  you  read  of  men  in  this  great  city  freez¬ 
ing  to  death  and  starving  to  death.  Prosperous  as  are 
these  times,  women  are  making  overalls  for  sixty  cents 
a  dozen,  and  you  can  hire  citizens  for  trivial  sums  to 
parade  up  and  down  the  streets  all  day  with  advertising 
placards  on  their  backs.  I  get  on  a  horse-car  and  ride 
with  the  driver.  He  is  evidently  a  sober,  steady  man, 
as  intelligent  as  a  man  can  be  who  drives  a  horse-car  all 
the  time  he  is  not  asleep  or  eating  his  meals.  He  tells 
me  has  a  wife  and  four  children.  He  gets  home  (if  rf 
couple  of  rooms  can  be  called  a  home)  at  two  o’clock  in 
the  morning  ;  he  has  to  be  back  on  his  car  at  nine.  Sun¬ 
day  he  has  a  couple  of  hours  more,  which  he  has  to  put 
in  in  sleep,  else,  as  he  says,  he  would  utterly  break  down. 
His  children  he  never  sees,  save  when  one  of  them  comes 
at  noon  or  supper-time  to  the  horse-car  route  with  some¬ 
thing  for  him  to  eat  in  a  tin  pail.  He  gets  for  his  day’s 
work  one  dollar  and  seventy-five  cents — a  sum  that  will 
buy  at  Delmonico’s  a  beefsteak  and  cup  of  coffee.  I  say 
to  him  that  it  must  be  pretty  hard  to  pay  rent  and  keep 
six  persons  on  one  dollar  and  seventy-five  cents  a  day. 
He  says  it  is  ;  that  he  has  been  trying  for  a  month  to  get 
enough  ahead  to  buy  a  new  pair  of  shoes,  but  he  hasn’t 


72 


THE  LA  HD  QUEST  I  OH. 


yet  succeeded.  I  ask  why  he  does  not  leave  such  a  joh 
He  says,  “What  can  I  do  ?  There  are  a  thousand  men 
ready  to  step  into  my  place  !”  And  so,  in  this  time  of 
prosperity,  he  is  chained  to  his  car.  The  horses  that  he 
drives,  they  are  changed  six  times  during  his  working- 
day.  They  have  lots  of  time  to  stretch  themselves  and 
rest  themselves  and  eat  in  peace  their  plentiful  meals, 
for  they  are  worth  from  one  to  two  hundred  dollars  each, 
and  it  would  be  a  loss  to  the  company  for  them  to  fall  ill. 
But  this  driver,  this  citizen  of  the  United  States,  he  may 
fall  ill  or  drop  dead,  and  the  company  would  not  lose  a 
cent.  As  between  him  and  the  beasts  he  drives,  I  am 
inclined  to  think  that  this  most  prosperous  era  is  more 
prosperous  for  horses  than  for  men. 

Our  Napoleon  of  Wall  Street,  our  rising  Charlemagne 
of  railroads,  who  came  to  this  city  with  nothing  but  a 
new  kind  of  mouse-trap  in  a  mahogany  box,  but  who 
now,  though  yet  in  the  vigor  of  his  prime,  counts  his 
wealth  by  hundreds  of  millions,  if  it  can  be  counted  at 
all,  is  interviewed  by  a  reporter  just  as  he  is  about  to 
step  aboard  his  palace-car  for  a  grand  combination  ex¬ 
pedition  into  the  Southwest.  He  descants  upon  the 
services  he  is  rendering  in  welding  into  one  big  ma¬ 
chine  a  lot  of  smaller  machines,  in  uniting  into  one  vast 
railroad  empire  the  separated  railroad  kingdoms.  He 
likewise  descants  upon  the  great  prosperity  of  the 
whole  country.  Everybody  is  prosperous  and  con¬ 
tented,  he  says  :  there  is,  of  course,  a  good  deal  of  mis¬ 
ery  in  the  big  cities,  but,  then,  there  always  is  ! 

Yet  not  alone  in  the  great  cities.  I  ride  on  the  Hud¬ 
son  River  Railroad  on  a  bitter  cold  day,  and  from  one 
of  the  pretty  towns  with  Dutch  names  gets  in  a  consta¬ 
ble  with  a  prisoner,  whom  he  is  to  take  to  the  Albany 
penitentiary.  In  this  case  justice  has  been  swift  enough, 
for  the  crime,  the  taking  of  a  shovel,  has  only  been 
committed  a  few  hours  before.  Such  coat  as  the  man 
has  he  keeps  buttoned  up,  even  in  the  hot  car,  for,  the 
constable  says,  he  has  no  underclothes  at  all.  He  stole 
the  shovel  to  get  to  the  penitentiary,  where  it  is  warm. 
The  constable  says  they  have  lots  of  such  cases,  and 
that  even  in  these  good  times  these  pretty  country  towns 
are  infested  with  such  tramps.  With  all  our  vast  organ¬ 
izing,  our  developing  of  productive  powers  and  cheap- 


THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS. 


73 


ening  of  transportation,  we  are  yet  creating  a  class  of 
utter  pariahs.  And  they  are  to  be  found  not  merely  in 
the  great  cities,  but  wherever  the  locomotive  runs. 

Is  it  real  advance  in  civilization  which,  on  the  one 
hand,  produces  these  great  captains  of  industry,  and, 
on  the  other,  these  social  outcasts  ? 

It  is  the  year  of  grace  1881,  and  of  the  Republic  the 
105th.  The  girl  who  has  brought  in  coal  for  my  fire  is 
twenty  years  old.  She  was  born  in  New  York,  and  can 
neither  read  nor  write.  To  me,  when  I  heard  it,  this 
seemed  sin  and  shame,  and  I  got  her  a  spelling  book. 
She  is  trying  what  she  can,  but  it  is  up-hill  work.  She 
has  really  no  time.  Last  night  when  I  came  in,  at 
eleven,  she  was  not  through  scrubbing  the  halls.  She 
gets  four  dollars  a  month.  Her  shoes  cost  two  dollars 
a  pair.  She  says  she  can  sew  ;  but  I  guess  it  is  about 
as  I  can.  In  the  natural  course  of  things,  this  girl  will 
be  a  mother  of  citizens  of  the  Republic. 

Underneath  are  girls  who  can  sew  ;  they  run  sewing- 
machines  with  their  feet  all  day.  I  have  seen  girls  in 
Asia  carrying  water-jugs  on  their  heads  and  young 
women  in  South  America  bearing  burdens.  They  were 
lithe  and  strong  and  symmetrical  ;  but  to  turn  a  young 
women  into  motive  power  for  a  sewing-machine  is  to 
weaken  and  injure  her  physically.  And  these  girls  are 
to  rear,  or  ought  to  rear,  citizens  of  the  Republic. 

But  there  is  worse  and  worse  than  this.  Go  out  into 
the  streets  at  night,  and  you  will  find  them  filled  with 
girls  who  will  never  be  mothers.  To  the  man  who  has 
known  the  love  of  mother,  of  sister,  of  sweetheart,  wife, 
and  daughter,  this  is  the  saddest  sight  of  all. 

The  ladies  of  the  Brooklyn  churches — they  are  get¬ 
ting  up  petitions  for  the  suppression  of  Mormon  polyg¬ 
amy  ;  they  would  have  it  rooted  out  writh  pains  and 
penalties,  trampled  out,  if  need  be,  with  fire  and  swrord  ; 
and  their  reverend  Congressman-elect  is  going,  when 
he  takes  his  seat,  to  introduce  a  most  stringent  bill  to 
that  end  ;  for  that  a  man  should  have  more  wives  than 
one  is  a  burning  scandal  in  a  Christian  country.  So  it 
is;  but  there  are  also  other  burning  scandals.  As  for 
scandals  that  excite  talk,  I  will  spare  Brooklyn  a  com 
parison  with  Salt  Lake.  But  as  to  ordinary  things  :  I 
have  walked  through  the  streets  of  Salt  Lake  City,  by 


74 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


day  and  by  night,  without  seeing  what  in  the  streets  oi 
New  York  or  Brooklyn  excites  no  comment.  Polygamy 
is  unnatural  and  wrong,  no  doubt  of  that,  for  Nature 
brings  into  the  world  something  over  twenty-two  boys 
for  every  twenty  girls.  But  is  not  a  state  of  society 
unnatural  and  wrong  in  which  there  are  thousands  and 
thousands  of  girls  for  whom  no  husband  ever  offers  ?  Can 
we  brag  of  a  state  of  society  in  which  one  citizen  can  load 
his  wife  with  more  diamonds  than  an  Indian  chief  can  put 
beads  on  his  squaw,  while  many  other  citizens  are 
afraid  to  marry  lest  they  can  not  support  a  wife — a  state 
of  society  in  which  prostitution  flourishes  ?  Polygamy 
is  bad,  but  is  it  not  better  than  that  ?  Civilization  is 
advancing  day  by  day  ;  never  was  such  progress  as  we 
are  making  !  Yet  divorces  are  increasing  and  insanity 
is  increasing.  What  is  the  goal  of  a  civilization  that 
tends  toward  free  love  and  the  madhouse  ? 

This  is  a  most  highly  civilized  community.  There  is 
not  a  bear  nor  wolf  on  Manhattan  Island,  save  in  a 
menagerie.  Yet  it  is  easier,  where  they  are  wTorst,  to 
guard  against  bears  and  wolves  than  it  is  to  guard 
against  the  human  beasts  of  prey  that  roam  this  island. 
In  this  highly  civilized  city  every  lower  window  has  to 
be  barred,  every  door  locked  and  bolted  ;  even  door¬ 
mats,  not  worth  twenty-five  cents,  you  will  see  chained 
to  the  steps.  Stop  for  a  moment  in  a  crowd  and  your 
watch  is  gone  as  if  by  magic  ;  shirt-studs  are  taken 
from  their  owners’  bosoms,  and  ear-rings  cut  from  la¬ 
dies’  ears.  Even  a  standing  army  of  policemen  do  not 
prevent  highway  robbery  ;  there  are  populous  districts 
that  to  walk  through  after  nightfall  is  a  risk,  and  where 
you  have  far  more  need  to  go  armed  and  to  be  wary 
than  in  the  backwoods.  There  are  dens  into  which  men 
are  lured  only  to  be  drugged  and  robbed,  sometimes  to 
be  murdered.  All  the  resources  of  science  and  inven¬ 
tive  genius  are  exhausted  in  making  burglar  proof 
strong-rooms  and  safes,  yet,  as  the  steel  plate  becomes 
thicker  and  harder,  so  does  the  burglar’s  tool  become 
keener.  If  the  combination  lock  can  not  be  picked,  it 
is  blown  open.  If  not  a  crack  large  enough  for  the  in¬ 
troduction  of  powder  is  left,  then  the  air-pump  is  ap¬ 
plied  and  a  vacuum  is  created.  So  that  those  who  in 
the  heart  of  civilization  would  guard  their  treasures 


THE  CIVILIZATION  THAT  IS. 


75 


safely  must  come  back  to  the  most  barbarous  device, 
and  either  themselves,  or  by  proxy,  sleeplessly  stand 
guard.  What  sort  of  a  civilization  is  this  ?  In  what 
does  civilization  essentially  consist  if  not  in  civility — 
that  is  to  say,  in  respect  for  the  rights  of  person  and  of 
property  ? 

Yet  this  is  not  all,  nor  the  worst.  These  are  but  the 
grosser  forms  of  that  spirit  that  in  the  midst  of  our  civ¬ 
ilization  compels  every  one  to  stand  on  guard.  What  is 
the  maxim  of  business  intercourse  among  the  most 
highly  respectable  classes  ?  That  if  you  are  swindled  it 
will  be  your  own  fault  ;  that  you  must  treat  every  man 
you  have  dealings  with  as  though  he  but  wanted  the 
chance  to  cheat  and  rob  you.  Caveat  emptor.  “  Let  the 
buyer  beware.”  If  a  man  steal  a  few  dollars  he  may 
stand  a  chance  of  going  to  the  penitentiary — I  read  the 
other  day  of  a  man  who  was  sent  to  the  penitentiary  for 
stealing  four  cents  from  a  horse-car  company.  But,  if 
he  steal  a  million  by  business  methods,  he  is  courted  and 
flattered,  even  though  he  steal  the  poor  little  savings 
which  washerwomen  and  sewing-girls  have  brought  to 
him  in  trust,  even  though  he  rob  widows  and  orphans 
of  the  security  which  dead  men  have  struggled  and 
stinted  to  provide. 

This  is  a  most  Christian  city.  There  are  churches 
and  churches.  All  sorts  of  churches,  where  are  preached 
all  sorts  of  religions,  save  that  which  once  in  Galilee 
taught  the  arrant  socialistic  doctrine  that  it  is  easier  for 
a  camel  to  pass  through  the  eye  of  a  needle  than  for  a 
rich  man  to  enter  the  kingdom  of  God  ;  all  save  that 
which  once  in  Jerusalem  drove  the  money-changers 
from  the  temple.  Churches  of  brown  and  gray  and 
yellow  stone,  lifting  toward  heaven  in  such  noble  sym¬ 
metry  that  architecture  seems  invocation  and  benison  ; 
where,  on  stained-glass  windows,  glow  angel  and  apos¬ 
tle,  and  the  entering  light  is  dimmed  to  a  soft  glory  ; 
where  such  music  throbs  and  supplicates  and  bursts  in 
joy  as  once  in  St.  Sophia  ravished  the  souls  of  heathen 
Northmen  ;  churches  where  richly  cushioned  pews  let 
for  the  very  highest  prices,  and  the  auctioneer  deter¬ 
mines  who  shall  sit  in  the  foremost  seats  ;  churches  out¬ 
side  of  which  on  Sunday  stand  long  lines  of  carriages, 
on  each  carriage  a  coachman,  And  there  are  white- 


7<$ 


THE  LA  HD  QUESTION", 


marble  churches,  so  pure  and  shapely  that  the  stone 
seems  to  have  bloomed  and  flowered — the  concrete  ex¬ 
pression  of  a  grand,  sweet  thought.  Churches  restful 
to  the  very  eye,  and  into  which  the  weary  and  heavy- 
laden  can  enter  and  join  in  the  worship  of  their  Creatoi 
for  no  larger  an  admission  fee  than  it  costs  on  the 
Bowery  to  see  the  bearded  lady  or  the  Zulu  giant  eight 
feet  high.  And  then  there  are  mission  churches,  run 
expressly  for  poor  people,  where  it  does  not  cost  a  cent. 
There  is  no  lack  of  churches.  There  are,  in  fact,  more 
churches  than  there  are  people  who  care  to  attend  them. 
And  there  are  likewise  Sunday-schools,  and  big  relig¬ 
ious  “book  concerns,”  and  tract  societies,  and  societies 
for  spreading  the  light  of  the  Gospel  among  the  heathen 
in  foreign  parts. 

Yet,  land  a  heathen  on  the  Battery  with  money  in  his 
pocket,  and  he  will  be  robbed  of  the  last  cent  of  it  be¬ 
fore  he  is  a  day  older.  “  By  their  fruits  shall  ye  know 
them.”  I  wonder  whether  they  who  send  missionaries 
to  the  heathen  ever  read  the  daily  papers.  I  think  I 
could  take  a  file  of  these  newspapers,  and  from  their 
daily  chroniclings  match  anything  that  could  be  told  in 
the  same  period  of  any  heathen  community — at  least, 
of  any  heathen  community  in  a  like  state  of  peace  and 
prosperity.  I  think  I  could  take  a  file  of  these  papers, 
and  match,  horror  for  horror,  all  that  returning  mis¬ 
sionaries  have  to  tell — even  to  the  car  of  Juggernaut  or 
infants  tossed  from  mothers’  arms  into  the  sacred  river  ; 
even  to  Ashantee  “customs”  or  cannibalistic  feasts. 

I  do  not  say  that  such  things  are  because  of  civiliza¬ 
tion,  or  because  of  Christianity.  On  the  contrary,  I 
point  to  them  as  inconsistent  with  civilization,  as  in¬ 
compatible  with  Christianity.  They  show  that  our  civ¬ 
ilization  is  one-sided  and  can  not  last  as  at  present 
based  ;  they  show  that  our  so-called  Christian  com¬ 
munities  are  not  Christian  at  all.  I  believe  a  civiliza¬ 
tion  is  possible  in  which  all  could  be  civilized — in  which 
such  things  would  be  impossible.  But  it  must  be  a 
civilization  based  on  justice  and  acknowledging  the 
equal  rights  of  all  to  natural  opportunities.  I  believe 
that  there  is  in  true  Christianity  a  power  to  regenerate 
the  world.  But  it  must  be  a  Christianity  that  attacks 
vested  wrongs,  not  that  spurious  thing  that  defends 


TRUE  CONSERVATISM . 


77 


them.  The  religion  which  allies  itself  with  injustice  to 
preach  down  the  natural  aspirations  of  the  masses  is 
worse  than  atheism. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

TRUE  CONSERVATISM. 

There  are  those  who  may  look  on  this  little  book  as 
very  radical,  in  the  bad  sense  they  attach  to  the  word. 
They  mistake.  This  is,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word,  a 
most  conservative  little  book.  I  do  not  appeal  to  prej¬ 
udice  and  passion.  I  appeal  to  intelligence.  I  do  not 
incite  to  strife  ;  I  seek  to  prevent  strife. 

That  the  civilized  world  is  on  the  verge  of  the  most 
tremendous  struggle,  which,  according  to  the  frankness 
and  sagacity  with  which  it  is  met,  will  be  a  struggle  of 
ideas  or  a  struggle  of  actual  physical  force,  calling 
upon  all  the  potent  agencies  of  destruction  which 
modern  invention  has  discovered,  every  sign  of  the 
times  portends.  The  voices  that  proclaim  the  eve  of 
revolution  are  in  the  air.  Steam  and  electricity  are  not 
merely  transporting  goods  and  carrying  messages. 
They  are  everywhere  changing  social  and  industrial  or¬ 
ganization  ;  they  are  everywhere  stimulating  thought, 
and  arousing  new  hopes  and  fears  and  desires  and  pas¬ 
sions  ;  they  are  everywhere  breaking  down  the  barriers 
that  have  separated  men,  and  integrating  nations  into 
one  vast  organism,  through  which  the  same  pulses 
throb  and  the  same  nerves  tingle. 

The  present  situation  in  Great  Britain  is  full  of  dan¬ 
gers,  of  dangers  graver  and  nearer  than  those  who  there 
are  making  history  are  likely  to  see.  Who  in  France, 
a  century  ago,  foresaw  the  drama  of  blood  so  soon  to 
open  ?  Who  in  the  United  States  dreamed  of  what 
was  coming  till  the  cannon-shgt  rang  and  the  flag  fell 
on  Sumter?  How  confidently  we  said,  “The  American 
people  are  too  intelligent,  too  practical,  to  go  to  cut¬ 
ting  each  other’s  throats  ”  !  How  confidently  we  relied 
upon  the  strong  common-sense  of  the  great  masses, 
upon  the  great  business  interests,  upon  the  univer- 


?8 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


sal  desire  to  make  money !  “  War  does  not  pay,”  we 

said,  “therefore  war  is  impossible.”  A  shot  rang  over 
Charleston  harbor  ;  a  bit  of  bunting  dropped,  and,  riven 
into  two  hostile  camps,  a  nation  sprang  to  its  feet  to 
close  in  the  death  lock. 

And  to  just  such  a  point  are  events  hurrying  in  Great 
Britain  to  day.  History  repeats  itself,  and  what  hap¬ 
pened  a  century  ago  on  one  side  of  the  English  Chan¬ 
nel  is  beginning  again  on  the  other.  Already  has  the 
States  General  met,  and  the  Third  Estate  put  on  their 
hats.  Already  Necker  is  in  despair.  Already  has  the 
lit  de  justice  been  held,  and  the  Tennis  Court  been 
locked,  and  ball-cartridge  been  served  to  the  Swiss 
Guard  !  For  the  moment  the  forces  of  reaction  tri¬ 
umph.  Davitt  is  snatched  to  prison;  a  “  Liberal  ”  gov¬ 
ernment  carries  coercion  by  a  tremendous  majority,  and 
the  most  despotic  powers  are  invoked  to  make  possible 
the  eviction  of  Irish  peasants.  The  order  of  Warsaw  is 
to  reign  in  Ireland,  and  the  upholders  of  ancient  wrong 
deem  it  secure  again,  as  the  wave  that  was  mounting 
seems  sweeping  back.  Let  them  wait  a  little  and  they 
will  see.  For  again  the  wave  wTill  mount,  and  higher 
and  higher,  and  soon  the  white  foam  will  seethe  and 
hiss  on  its  toppling  crest.  It  is  not  true  conservatism 
which  cries  “  Peace  !  peace  !  ”  when  there  is  no  peace  ; 
which,  like  the  ostrich,  sticks  its  head  in  the  sand  and 
fancies  itself  secure  ;  which  would  compromise  matters 
by  putting  more  coal  in  the  furnace,  and  hanging 
heavier  weights  on  the  safety-valve  !  That  alone  is 
true  conservatism  which  would  look  facts  in  the  face, 
which  would  reconcile  opposing  forces  on  the  only 
basis  on  which  reconciliation  is  possible — that  of  jus¬ 
tice. 

I  speak  again  of  Great  Britain,  but  I  speak  with  ref¬ 
erence  to  the  whole  modern  wrorld.  The  true  nature  of 
the  inevitable  conflict  with  which  modern  civilization 
is  everywhere  beginning  to  throb,  can,  it  seems  to  me, 
best  be  seen  in  the  United  States,  and  in  the  newer 
States  even  more  clearly  than  in  the  older  States. 
That  intelligent  Englishmen  imagine  that  in  the  de¬ 
mocratization  of  political  institutions,  in  free  trade  in 
land,  or  in  peasant  proprietorship,  can  be  found  any 
solution  of  the  difficulties  which  are  confronting  them, 


TRUE  CONSERVATISM. 


79 


is  because  they  do  not  see  what  may  be  seen  in  the 
United  States  by  whoever  will  look.  That  intelligent 
Americans  imagine  that  by  these  questions  which  are 
so  menacingly  presenting  themselves  in  Europe  their 
peace  is  to  be  unvexed,  is  because  they  shut  their  eyes  to 
what  is  going  on  around  them,  because  they  attribute 
to  themselves  and  their  institutions  what  is  really  due 
to  conditions  now  rapidly  passing  away — to  the  sparse¬ 
ness  of  population  and  the  cheapness  of  land.  Yet  it  is 
here,  in  this  American  Republic,  that  the  true  nature  of 
that  inevitable  conflict  now  rapidly  approaching  which 
must  determine  the  fate  of  modern  civilization  may  be 
most  clearly  seen. 

We  have  here  abolished  all  hereditary  privileges  and 
legal  distinctions  of  class.  Monarchy,  aristocracy,  prel¬ 
acy,  we  have  swept  them  all  away.  We  have  carried 
mere  political  democracy  to  its  ultimate.  Every  child 
born  in  the  United  States  may  aspire  to  be  President. 
Every  man,  even  though  he  be  a  tramp  or  a  pauper, 
has  a  vote,  and  one  man’s  vote  counts  for  as  much  as  any 
other  man’s  vote.  Before  the  law  all  citizens  are  abso¬ 
lutely  equal.  In  the  name  of  the  people  all  laws  run. 
They  are  the  source  of  all  power,  the  fountain  of  all 
honor.  In  their  name  and  by  their  will  all  government 
is  carried  on  ;  the  highest  officials  are  but  their  servants. 
Primogeniture  and  entail  we  have  abolished  wherever 
they  existed.  We  have  and  have  had  free  trade  in  land. 
We  started  with  something  infinitely  better  than  any 
scheme  of  peasant  proprietorship  which  it  is  possible  to 
carry  into  effect  in  Great  Britain.  We  have  had  for 
our  public  domain  the  best  part  of  an  immense  conti¬ 
nent.  We  have  had  the  pre-emption  law  and  the  home¬ 
stead  law.  It  has  been  our  boast  that  here  every  one  who 
wished  it  could  have  a  farm.  We  have  had  full  liberty 
of  speech  and  of  the  press.  We  have  not  merely  com¬ 
mon  schools,  but  high  schools  and  universities,  open  to 
all  who  may  choose  to  attend.  Yet  here  the  same  social 
difficulties  apparent  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic 
are  beginning  to  appear.  It  is  already  clear  that  our 
democracy  is  a  vain  pretence,  our  make-believe  of 
equality  a  sham  and  a  fraud. 

Already  are  the  sovereign  people  becoming  but  a  rot 
faineant ,  like  the  Merovingian  kings  of  France,  like  the 


TILE  LAND  QUESTION. 


So 

Mikados  of  Japan.  The  shadow  of  power  is  theirs; 
but  the  substance  of  power  is  being  grasped  and  wielded 
by  the  bandit  chiefs  of  the  stock  exchange,  the  robber 
leaders  who  organize  politics  into  machines.  In  any 
matter  in  which  they  are  interested,  the  little  finger 
of  the  great  corporations  is  thicker  than  the  loins  of 
the  people.  Is  it  sovereign  States  or  is  it  railroad  cor¬ 
porations  that  are  really  represented  in  the  elective 
Senate  which  we  have  substituted  for  an  hereditary 
House  of  Lords?  Where  is  the  count  or  marquis  or 
duke  in  Europe  who  wields  such  power  as  is  wielded 
by  such  simple  citizens  as  our  Stanfords,  Goulds,  and 
Vanderbilts  ?  What  does  legal  equality  amount  to, 
when  the  fortunes  of  some  citizens  can  only  be  esti¬ 
mated  in  hundreds  of  millions,  and  other  citizens  have 
nothing  ?  What  does  the  suffrage  amount  to  when,  un¬ 
der  threat  of  discharge  from  employment,  citizens  can 
be  forced  to  vote  as  their  employers  dictate  ?  when 
votes  can  be  bought  on  election  day  for  a  few  dollars 
apiece  ?  If  there  are  citizens  so  dependent  that  they 
must  vote  as  their  employers  wish,  so  poor  that  a  few 
dollars  on  election  day  seem  to  them  more  than  any 
higher  consideration,  then  giving  them  votes  simply 
adds  to  the  political  power  of  wealth,  and  universal 
suffrage  becomes  the  surest  basis  for  the  establishment 
of  tyranny.  “Tyranny!”  There  is  a  lesson  in  the 
very  word.  What  are  our  American  bosses  but  the  ex¬ 
act  antitypes  of  the  Greek  tyrants,  from  whom  the 
word  comes  ?  They  who  gave  the  word  tyrant  its  mean¬ 
ing  did  not  claim  to  rule  by  right  divine.  They  were 
simply  the  Grand  Sachems  of  Greek  Tammanys,  the 
organizers  of  Hellenic  “stalwart  machines.” 

Even  if  universal  history  did  not  teach  the  lesson,  it 
is  in  the  United  States  already  becoming  very  evident 
that  political  equality  can  only  continue  to  exist  upon 
a  basis  of  social  equality  ;  that  where  the  disparity  in 
the  distribution  of  wealth  increases,  political  democracy 
only  makes  easier  the  concentration  of  power,  and  must 
inevitably  lead  to  tyranny  and  anarchy.  And  it  is  al¬ 
ready  evident  that  there  is  nothing  in  political  de¬ 
mocracy,  nothing  in  popular  education,  nothing  in  any 
of  our  American  institutions,  to  prevent  the  most  enor¬ 
mous  disparity  in  the  distribution  of  wealth.  Nowhere 


TRUE  CONSERVATISM. 


81 

in  the  world  are  such  great  fortunes  growing  up  as  in  the 
United  States.  Considering  that  the  average  income 
of  the  working  masses  of  our  people  is  only  a  few  hun¬ 
dred  dollars  a  year,  a  fortune  of  a  million  dollars  is  a 
monstrous  thing — a  more  monstrous  and  dangerous 
thing  under  a  democratic  government  than  anywhere 
else.  Yet  fortunes  of  ten  and  twelve  million  dollars  are 
with  us  ceasing  to  be  noticeable.  We  already  have 
citizens  whose  wealth  can  only  be  estimated  in  hun¬ 
dreds  of  millions,  and  before  the  end  of  the  century,  if 
present  tendencies  continue,  we  are  likely  to  have  for¬ 
tunes  estimated  in  thousands  of  millions — such  mon¬ 
strous  fortunes  as  the  world  has  never  seen  since  the 
growth  of  similar  fortunes  ate  out  the  heart  of  Rome. 
And  the  necessary  correlative  of  the  growth  of  such  for¬ 
tunes  is  the  impoverishment  and  loss  of  independence 
on  the  part  of  the  masses.  These  great  aggregations  of 
wealth  are  like  great  trees,  which  strike  deep  roots  and 
spread  wide  branches,  and  which,  by  sucking  up  the 
moisture  from  the  soil  and  intercepting  the  sunshine, 
stunt  and  kill  the  vegetation  around  them.  When  a  capi¬ 
tal  of  a  million  dollars  comes  into  competition  with  capi¬ 
tals  of  thousands  of  dollars,  the  smaller  capitalists  must 
be  driven  out  of  the  business  or  destroyed.  With  great 
capital  nothing  can  compete  save  great  capital.  Hence, 
every  aggregation  of  wealth  increases  the  tendency  to 
the  aggregation  of  wealth,  and  decreases  the  possibility 
of  the  employee  ever  becoming  more  than  an  employee, 
compelling  him  to  compete  with  his  fellows  as  to  who 
will  work  cheapest  for  the  great  capitalist — a  competi¬ 
tion  that  can  have  but  one  result,  that  of  forcing  wages 
to  the  minimum  at  which  the  supply  of  labor  can  be 
kept  up.  Where  we  are  is  not  so  important  as  in  what 
direction  we  are  going,  and  in  the  United  States  all  ten¬ 
dencies  are  clearly  in  this  direction.  A  while  ago,  and  any 
journeyman  shoemaker  could  set  up  in  business  for  him¬ 
self  with  the  savings  of  a  few  months.  But  now  the 
operative  shoemaker  could  not  in  a  lifetime  save  enough 
from  his  wages  to  go  into  business  for  himself.  And,  now 
that  great  capital  has  entered  agriculture,  it  must  be  with 
the  same  results.  The  large  farmer,  who  can  buy  the 
latest  machinery  at  the  lowest  cash  prices  and  use  it  to  the 
best  advantage,  who  can  run  a  straight  furrow  for  miles. 

6  " 


82 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


who  can  make  special  rates  wTith  railroad  companies* 
take  advantage  of  the  market,  and  sell  in  large  lots  for 
the  least  commission,  must  drive  out  the  small  farmer 
of  the  early  American  type  just  as  the  shoe  factory  has 
driven  out  the  journeyman  shoemaker.  And  this  is 
going  on  to-day. 

There  is  nothing  unnatural  in  this.  On  the  contrary, 
it  is  in  the  highest  degree  natural.  Social  development 
is  in  accordance  with  certain  immutable  laws.  And  the 
law  of  development,  whether  it  be  the  development  of 
a  solar  system,  of  the  tiniest  organism,  or  of  a  human  so¬ 
ciety,  is  the  law  of  integration.  It  is  in  obedience  to 
this  law — a  law  evidently  as  all-compelling  as  the  law  of 
gravitation — that  these  new  agencies,  which  so  powerfully 
stimulate  social  growth,  tend  to  the  specialization  and 
interdependence  of  industry.  It  is  in  obedience  to  this 
law  that  the  factory  is  superseding  the  independent  me¬ 
chanic,  the  large  farm  is  swallowing  up  the  little  one, 
the  big  store  shutting  up  the  small  one,  that  corpora- 
tions  are  arising  that  dwarf  the  State,  and  that  popula¬ 
tion  tends  more  and  more  to  concentrate  in  cities- 
Men  must  work  together  in  larger  and  in  more  closely  re¬ 
lated  groups.  Production  must  be  on  agreater  scale.  The 
only  question  is,  whether  the  relation  in  which  men  are 
thus  drawn  together  and  compelled  to  act  together  shall 
be  the  natural  relation  of  interdependence  in  equality, 
or  in  the  unnatural  relation  of  dependence  upon  a  mas¬ 
ter.  If  the  one,  then  may  civilization  advance  in  what 
is  evidently  the  natural  order,  each  step  leading  to  a 
higher  step.  If  the  other,  then  what  Nature  has  in¬ 
tended  as  a  blessing  becomes  a  curse,  and  a  condition 
of  inequality  is  produced  which  will  inevitably  destroy 
civilization.  Every  new  invention  but  hastens  the 
catastrophe. 

Now,  all  this  we  may  deduce  from  natural  laws  as 
fixed  and  certain  as  the  law  of  gravitation.  And  all  this 
we  may  see  going  on  to-day.  This  is  the  reason  why 
modern  progress,  great  as  it  has  been,  fails  to  relieve 
poverty  ;  this  is  the  secret  of  the  increasing  discontent 
which  pervades  every  civilized  country.  Under  present 
conditions,  with  land  treated  as  private  property,  mate¬ 
rial  progress  is  developing  two  diverse  tendencies,  two 
opposing  currents.  On  the  one  side,  the  tendency  of 


TRUE  CONSERVATISM. 


83 


increasing  population  and  of  all  improvement  in  the 
arts  of  production  is  to  build  up  enormous  fortunes,  to 
wipe  out  the  intermediate  classes,  and  to  crowd  down 
the  masses  to  a  level  of  lower  wages  and  greater  de¬ 
pendence.  On  the  other  hand,  by  bringing  men  closer 
together,  by  stimulating  thought,  by  creating  new  wants, 
by  arousing  new  ambitions,  the  tendency  of  modern 
progress  is  to  make  the  masses  discontented  with  their 
condition,  to  feel  bitterly  its  injustice.  The  result  can 
be  predicted  just  as  certainly  as  the  result  can  be  pre¬ 
dicted  when  two  trains  are  rushing  toward  each  other 
on  the  same  track. 

This  thing  is  absolutely  certain  :  Private  property  in 
land  blocks  the  way  of  advancing  civilization.  The  two 
can  not  long  coexist.  Either  private  property  in  land 
must  be  abolished,  or,  as  has  happened  again  and  again 
in  the  history  of  mankind,  civilization  must  again  turn 
back  in  anarchy  and  bloodshed.  Let  the  remaining 
years  of  the  nineteenth  century  bear  me  witness.  Even 
now,  I  believe,  the  inevitable  struggle  has  begun.  It  is 
not  conservatism  which  would  ignore  such  a  tremendous 
fact.  It  is  the  blindness  that  invites  destruction.  He 
that  is  truly  conservative  let  him  look  the  facts  in  the 
face  ;  let  him  speak  frankly  and  dispassionately.  This 
is  the  duty  of  the  hour.  For,  when  a  great  social  ques¬ 
tion  presses  for  settlement,  it  is  only  for  a  little  while 
that  the  voice  of  Reason  can  be  heard.  The  masses  of 
men  hardly  think  at  any  time.  It  is  difficult  even  in 
sober  moments  to  get  them  to  calmly  reason.  But  when 
passion  is  roused,  then  they  are  like  a  herd  of  stampeded 
bulls.  I  do  not  fear  that  present  social  adjustments  can 
continue.  That  is  impossible.  What  I  fear  is  that  the 
dams  may  hold  till  the  flood  rises  to  fury.  What  1  fear 
is  that  dogged  resistance  on  the  one  side  may  kindle  a 
passionate  sense  of  wrong  on  the  other.  What  I  fear 
a>*e  the  demagogues  and  the  accidents. 

The  present  condition  of  all  civilized  countries  is  that 
of  increasing  unstable  equilibrium.  In  steam  and  elec¬ 
tricity,  and  all  the  countless  inventions  which  they  typify, 
mighty  forces  have  entered  the  world.  If  rightly  used, 
they  are  our  servants,  more  potent  to  do  our  bidding 
than  the  genii  of  Arabian  story.  If  wrongly  used,  they, 
too,  must  turn  to  monsters  of  destruction.  They  re* 


THE  LAND  QUESTION. 


84 

quire  and  will  compel  great  social  changes.  That  we 
may  already  see.  Operating  under  social  institutions 
which  are  based  on  natural  justice,  which  acknowledge 
the  equal  rights  of  all  to  the  material  and  opportunities 
of  nature,  their  elevating  power  will  be  equally  exerted, 
and  industrial  organization  will  pass  naturally  into  that 
of  a  vast  co-operative  society.  Operating  under  social 
institutions  which  deny  natural  justice  by  treating  land 
as  private  property,  their  power  is  unequally  exerted, 
and  tends,  by  producing  inequality,  to  engender  forces 
that  will  tear  and  rend  and  shatter.  The  old  bottles 
can  not  hold  the  new  wine.  This  is  the  ferment  which 
throughout  the  civilized  world  is  everywhere  beginning. 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

IN  HOC  SIGNO  VINCES. 

Let  me  recapitulate. 

What  I  want  to  impress  upon  those  who  may  read 
this  paper  is  this  : 

The  land  question  is  nowhere  a  mere  local  question  ; 
it  is  a  universal  question.  It  involves  the  great  problem 
of  the  distribution  of  wealth,  which  is  everywhere  forc¬ 
ing  itself  upon  attention. 

It  can  not  be  settled  by  measures  which  in  their  na¬ 
ture  can  have  but  local  application.  It  can  only  be 
settled  by  measures  which  in  their  nature  will  apply 
everywhere. 

It  can  not  be  settled  by  half-way  measures.  It  can 
only  be  settled  by  the  acknowledgment  of  equal  rights 
to  land.  Upon  this  basis  it  can  be  settled  easily  and 
permanently. 

If  the  Irish  reformers  take  this  ground,  they  will 
make  their  fight  the  common  fight  of  all  the  peoples  , 
they  will  concentrate  strength  and  divide  opposition. 
They  will  turn  the  flank  of  the  system  that  oppresses 
them,  and  awake  the  struggle  in  its  very  intrenchments 
They  will  rouse  against  it  a  force  that  is  like  the  force  of 
rising  tides. 

What  I  urge  the  men  of  Ireland  to  do  is  to  proclaim. 


IN  HOC  SIGNO  VINCES. 


*5 


without  limitation  or  evasion,  that  the  land,  of  natu:ral 
right,  is  the  common  property  of  the  whole  people,  aud 
to  propose  practical  measures  which  will  recognize  tnvs 
right  in  all  countries  as  well  as  in  Ireland. 

What  I  urge  the  Land  Leagues  of  the  United  States  to 
do  is  to  announce  this  great  principle  as  of  universal 
application  ;  to  give  their  movement  a  reference  to 
America  as  well  as  to  Ireland  ;  to  broaden  and  deepen 
and  strengthen  it  by  making  it  a  movement  for  the  re¬ 
generation  of  the  world — a  movement  which  shall  con¬ 
centrate  and  give  shape  to  aspirations  that  are  stirring 
among  all  nations. 

Ask  not  for  Ireland  mere  charity  or  sympathy.  Let 
her  call  be  the  call  of  fraternity  :  “  For  yourselves,  O 
brothers,  as  well  as  for  us  !  ”  Let  her  rallying  cry  awake 
all  who  slumber,  and  rouse  to  a  common  struggle  all 
who  are  oppressed.  Let  it  breathe  not  old  hates  ;  let  it 
ring  and  echo  with  the  new  hope  ! 

In  many  lands  her  sons  are  true  to  her  ;  under  many 
skies  her  daughters  burn  with  the  love  of  her.  Lo  !  the 
ages  bring  their  opportunity.  Let  those  who  would 
honor  her  bear  her  banner  to  the  front ! 

The  harp  and  the  shamrock,  the  golden  sunburst  on 
the  field  of  living  green  !  emblems  of  a  country  without 
nationality  ;  standard  of  a  people  down-trodden  and  op¬ 
pressed  !  The  hour  has  come  when  they  may  lead  the 
van  of  the  great  world-struggle.  Types  of  harmony  and 
of  ever-springing  hope,  of  light  and  of  life  !  The  hour 
has  come  when  they  may  stand  for  something  higher 
than  local  patriotism  ;  something  grander  than  national 
independence.  The  hour  has  come  when  they  may  stand 
forth  to  speak  the  world’s  hope,  to  lead  the  world’s  ad¬ 
vance  ! 

Torn  away  by  pirates,  tending  in  a  strange  land  a  hea¬ 
then  master’s  swine,  the  slave  boy,  with  the  spirit  of 
Christ  in  his  heart,  praying  in  the  snow  for  those  who 
had  enslaved  him,  and  returning  to  bring  to  his  op¬ 
pressors  the  message  of  the  Gospel,  returning  with  good 
to  give  where  evil  had  been  received,  to  kindle  in  the 
darkness  a  great  light — this  is  Ireland’s  patron  saint. 
In  his  spirit  let  Ireland’s  struggle  be.  Not  merely 
through  Irish  vales  and  hamlets,  but  into  England,  into 
Scotland,  into  Wales,  wherever  our  common  tongue  is 


86 


THE  LA  HD  QUEST  I  OH. 


spoken,  let  the  torch  be  carried  and  the  word  ba 
preached.  And  beyond  !  The  brotherhood  of  man 
stops  not  with  differences  of  speech  any  more  than  with 
seas  or  mountain  chains.  A  century  ago  it  was  ours  to 
speak  the  ringing  word.  Then  it  was  France’s.  Now  it 
may  be  Ireland’s,  if  her  sons  be  true. 

But  wherever,  or  by  whom,  the  word  must  be  spoken, 
the  standard  will  be  raised.  No  matter  what  the  Irish 
leaders  do  or  do  not  do,  it  is  too  late  to  permanently  set¬ 
tle  the  question  on  any  basis  short  of  the  recognition  of 
equal  natural  right.  And,  whether  the  Land  Leagues 
move  forward  or  slink  back,  the  agitation  must  spread 
to  this  side  of  the  Atlantic.  The  Republic,  the  true 
Republic,  is  not  yet  here.  But  her  birth  struggle  must 
soon  begin.  Already,  with  the  hope  of  her,  men’s 
thoughts  are  stirring. 

Not  a  republic  of  landlords  and  peasants  ;  not  a  re¬ 
public  of  millionaires  and  tramps  ;  not  a  republic  in 
which  some  are  masters  and  some  serve.  But  a  repub¬ 
lic  of  equal  citizens,  where  competition  becomes  co¬ 
operation,  and  the  interdependence  of  all  gives  true 
independence  to  each ;  where  moral  progress  goes 
hand-in-hand  with  intellectual  progress,  and  material 
progress  elevates  and  enfranchises  even  the  poorest 
and  weakest  and  lowliest. 

And  the  gospel  of  deliverance,  let  us  not  forget  it :  it 
is  the  gospel  of  love,  not  of  hate.  He  whom  it  eman¬ 
cipates  will  know  neither  Jew  nor  Gentile,  nor  Irishman 
nor  Englishman,  nor  German  nor  Frenchman,  nor 
European  nor  American,  nor  difference  of  color  nor  of 
race,  nor  animosities  of  class  nor  condition.  Let  us  set 
our  feet  on  old  prejudices,  let  us  bury  the  old  hates. 
There  have  been  “  Iloly  Alliances  ”  of  kings.  Let  us 
strive  for  the  Holy  Alliance  of  the  people. 

Liberty,  equality,  fraternity !  Write  them  on  the 
banners.  Let  them  be  for  sign  and  countersign.  With¬ 
out  equality,  liberty  can  not  be ;  without  fraternity, 
neither  equality  nor  libertv  can  be  achieved. 

Liberty — the  full  freedom  of  each  bounded  only  by 
the  equal  freedom  of  every  other. 

Equality — the  equal  right  of  each  to  the  use  and  en¬ 
joyment  of  all  natural  opportunities,  to  all  the  essentials 
of  happy,  healthful,  human  life  ! 


IN  HOC  SIGNO  VINCES . 


87 


Fraternity — that  sympathy  which  links  together  those 
who  struggle  in  a  noble  cause;  that  would  live  and  let 
live;  that  would  help  as  well  as  be  helped;  that,' in  seek¬ 
ing  the  good  of  all,  finds  the  highest  good  of  each  ! 

“By  this  sign  shall  ye  conquer  !  ” 

“  We  hold  these  truths  to  be  self-evident:  That  all  men 
are  created  equal;  that  they  are  endowed  by  their  Creator 
with  certain  tuialienable  rights;  that  amo?ig  these  are  life , 
liberty ,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness  !  ” 

It  is  over  a  century  since  these  words  rang  out.  It  is 
time  to  give  them  their  full,  true  meaning.  Let  the  stand¬ 
ard  be  lifted  that  all  may  see  it;  let  the  advance  be  sounded 
that  all  may  hear  it.  Let  those  who  would  fall  back,  fall 
back.  Let  those  who  would  oppose,  oppose.  Everywhere 
are  those  who  will  rally.  The  stars  in  their  courses  fight 
against  Sisera  ! 

Henry  George. 

New  York,  February  28,  1881. 


, 


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